F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) Price Target Raised to $269.00

F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) had its target price hoisted by Piper Sandler from $262.00 to $269.00 in a research report released on Tuesday,Benzinga reports. They currently have a neutral rating on the network technology company’s stock.

Several other equities analysts also recently issued reports on the stock. Royal Bank of Canada boosted their price target on shares of F5 from $260.00 to $310.00 and gave the company a “sector perform” rating in a report on Wednesday, January 29th. Morgan Stanley upped their target price on shares of F5 from $269.00 to $280.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Tuesday. JPMorgan Chase & Co. cut their price target on F5 from $296.00 to $285.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, April 17th. Barclays decreased their price objective on F5 from $296.00 to $274.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a report on Tuesday. Finally, Evercore ISI lifted their target price on F5 from $240.00 to $270.00 and gave the company an “in-line” rating in a research note on Friday, January 17th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, seven have assigned a hold rating and two have given a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $282.56.

F5 Stock Performance

Shares of NASDAQ:FFIV opened at $265.77 on Tuesday. F5 has a 1-year low of $163.12 and a 1-year high of $313.00. The company’s fifty day moving average is $266.38 and its two-hundred day moving average is $261.65. The stock has a market capitalization of $15.32 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 26.42, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.85 and a beta of 1.14.

F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) last issued its earnings results on Monday, April 28th. The network technology company reported $3.42 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.11 by $0.31. The firm had revenue of $590.16 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $719.91 million. F5 had a net margin of 20.58% and a return on equity of 20.98%. F5’s revenue was up 7.3% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter last year, the company posted $2.91 earnings per share. Sell-side analysts expect that F5 will post 11.2 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, Director Marianne Budnik sold 1,872 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Friday, March 14th. The stock was sold at an average price of $260.72, for a total transaction of $488,067.84. Following the completion of the sale, the director now directly owns 1,207 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $314,689.04. This represents a 60.80 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Also, CEO Francois Locoh-Donou sold 6,500 shares of F5 stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, February 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $303.06, for a total value of $1,969,890.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 151,247 shares in the company, valued at $45,836,915.82. This represents a 4.12 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 17,504 shares of company stock valued at $5,088,492 over the last three months. Company insiders own 0.52% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the company. GAMMA Investing LLC grew its position in F5 by 34,698.9% during the 1st quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 746,089 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $198,661,000 after purchasing an additional 743,945 shares in the last quarter. Norges Bank acquired a new stake in shares of F5 in the fourth quarter worth $171,127,000. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership boosted its position in shares of F5 by 598.3% in the fourth quarter. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership now owns 425,275 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $106,944,000 after buying an additional 364,372 shares during the period. Robeco Institutional Asset Management B.V. grew its holdings in shares of F5 by 110.4% during the first quarter. Robeco Institutional Asset Management B.V. now owns 560,493 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $149,242,000 after buying an additional 294,050 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Northern Trust Corp raised its position in F5 by 38.0% during the fourth quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 913,021 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $229,597,000 after buying an additional 251,534 shares during the period. 90.66% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

F5 Company Profile

F5, Inc provides multi-cloud application security and delivery solutions in the United States, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and the Asia Pacific region. The company’s distributed cloud services enable its customers to deploy, secure, and operate applications in any architecture, from on-premises to the public cloud.