NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) Earns Neutral Rating from Wedbush

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP)‘s stock had its “neutral” rating reissued by analysts at Wedbush in a research report issued on Friday,RTT News reports. They presently have a $120.00 price objective on the data storage provider’s stock. Wedbush’s price target would indicate a potential downside of 1.91% from the company’s previous close.

A number of other research firms have also recently weighed in on NTAP. UBS Group upped their price target on NetApp from $121.00 to $134.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday, August 29th. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their price target on shares of NetApp from $135.00 to $140.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Friday. Barclays lifted their price target on shares of NetApp from $119.00 to $132.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Friday. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised their target price on NetApp from $146.00 to $147.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday, August 29th. Finally, Morgan Stanley boosted their price target on NetApp from $127.00 to $132.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Friday. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, eleven have assigned a hold rating and six have issued a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, NetApp currently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $134.00.

NetApp Price Performance

NTAP opened at $122.34 on Friday. NetApp has a 52-week low of $77.56 and a 52-week high of $135.45. The company has a 50 day moving average of $121.87 and a two-hundred day moving average of $122.59. The company has a market cap of $25.05 billion, a P/E ratio of 22.49, a P/E/G ratio of 3.26 and a beta of 1.24. The company has a quick ratio of 0.91, a current ratio of 0.96 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.34.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last released its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, November 21st. The data storage provider reported $1.87 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.78 by $0.09. The company had revenue of $1.66 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.65 billion. NetApp had a return on equity of 119.68% and a net margin of 17.78%. The firm’s revenue was up 6.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the company posted $1.23 earnings per share. On average, analysts expect that NetApp will post 5.71 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Activity at NetApp

In other NetApp news, CAO Lorenzo Daniel De sold 326 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Monday, November 18th. The stock was sold at an average price of $117.44, for a total value of $38,285.44. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, CEO George Kurian sold 8,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, October 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $126.11, for a total transaction of $1,071,935.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 292,778 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $36,922,233.58. This represents a 2.82 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 23,049 shares of company stock valued at $2,807,851 in the last quarter. Insiders own 0.47% of the company’s stock.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On NetApp

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in NTAP. Hollencrest Capital Management bought a new position in NetApp in the 2nd quarter valued at about $26,000. Northwest Investment Counselors LLC acquired a new position in shares of NetApp during the third quarter valued at approximately $27,000. New Covenant Trust Company N.A. bought a new stake in NetApp during the first quarter worth approximately $28,000. Redwood Wealth Management Group LLC acquired a new stake in NetApp in the second quarter worth approximately $32,000. Finally, True Wealth Design LLC boosted its stake in NetApp by 2,833.3% during the 3rd quarter. True Wealth Design LLC now owns 352 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $43,000 after purchasing an additional 340 shares in the last quarter. 92.17% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

About NetApp

NetApp, Inc provides cloud-led and data-centric services to manage and share data on-premises, and private and public clouds worldwide. It operates in two segments, Hybrid Cloud and Public Could. The company offers intelligent data management software, such as NetApp ONTAP, NetApp Snapshot, NetApp SnapCenter Backup Management, NetApp SnapMirror Data Replication, NetApp SnapLock Data Compliance, and storage infrastructure solutions, including NetApp All-Flash FAS series, NetApp Fabric Attached Storage, NetApp E/EF series, and NetApp StorageGRID.