NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) Stock Price Expected to Rise, Northland Securities Analyst Says

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) had its price objective upped by equities research analysts at Northland Securities from $108.00 to $120.00 in a research note issued to investors on Friday,Benzinga reports. The firm presently has a “market perform” rating on the data storage provider’s stock. Northland Securities’ price target indicates a potential downside of 1.91% from the stock’s current price.

A number of other equities analysts have also recently issued reports on the company. Citigroup increased their target price on NetApp from $120.00 to $130.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday, August 15th. Susquehanna reiterated a “positive” rating and set a $155.00 price objective on shares of NetApp in a report on Monday, August 26th. Evercore ISI upped their target price on shares of NetApp from $120.00 to $130.00 and gave the stock an “in-line” rating in a report on Monday, August 12th. Oppenheimer started coverage on shares of NetApp in a research report on Wednesday, November 13th. They issued a “market perform” rating on the stock. Finally, Stifel Nicolaus boosted their price objective on NetApp from $138.00 to $140.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, August 29th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, eleven have given a hold rating and six have issued a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $134.00.

NetApp Trading Down 3.4 %

NASDAQ:NTAP opened at $122.34 on Friday. NetApp has a 12 month low of $77.56 and a 12 month high of $135.45. The company has a current ratio of 0.96, a quick ratio of 0.91 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.34. The stock has a market capitalization of $25.05 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 22.49, a PEG ratio of 3.26 and a beta of 1.24. The firm has a fifty day simple moving average of $121.87 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $122.59.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last issued its earnings results 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. NetApp had a return on equity of 119.68% and a net margin of 17.78%. The company had revenue of $1.66 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.65 billion. During the same period last year, the business posted $1.23 EPS. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 6.1% compared to the same quarter last year. Analysts expect that NetApp will post 5.71 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Activity

In related news, CEO George Kurian sold 8,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, October 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $126.11, for a total transaction of $1,071,935.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 292,778 shares in the company, valued at approximately $36,922,233.58. This represents a 2.82 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, EVP Elizabeth M. O’callahan sold 705 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, October 10th. The stock was sold at an average price of $126.20, for a total transaction of $88,971.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president now directly owns 11,694 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,475,782.80. This trade represents a 5.69 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 23,049 shares of company stock valued at $2,807,851 in the last three months. Company insiders own 0.47% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On NetApp

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of NTAP. AQR Capital Management LLC raised its position in shares of NetApp by 59.6% in the second quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 1,643,146 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $211,637,000 after buying an additional 613,583 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC raised its holdings in shares of NetApp by 8.2% in the 3rd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 5,985,673 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $738,280,000 after acquiring an additional 453,324 shares in the last quarter. TCW Group Inc. bought a new stake in shares of NetApp during the 2nd quarter valued at about $56,313,000. Acadian Asset Management LLC grew its holdings in shares of NetApp by 17.5% during the second quarter. Acadian Asset Management LLC now owns 2,791,599 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $359,517,000 after purchasing an additional 416,233 shares in the last quarter. Finally, APG Asset Management US Inc. bought a new position in shares of NetApp in the second quarter worth approximately $48,074,000. 92.17% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

NetApp Company Profile

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.