NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) CEO Sells $1,071,935.00 in Stock

NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) CEO George Kurian sold 8,500 shares of the firm’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 value of $1,071,935.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 292,778 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $36,922,233.58. This trade represents a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website.

NetApp Stock Performance

Shares of NASDAQ NTAP traded down $0.74 during mid-day trading on Wednesday, hitting $119.01. The company had a trading volume of 1,521,744 shares, compared to its average volume of 1,832,735. The company has a market capitalization of $24.49 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 25.65, a P/E/G ratio of 4.77 and a beta of 1.23. NetApp, Inc. has a 1 year low of $70.82 and a 1 year high of $135.01. 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’s 50-day moving average price is $123.60 and its 200-day moving average price is $119.85.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, August 28th. The data storage provider reported $1.56 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.45 by $0.11. NetApp had a return on equity of 121.41% and a net margin of 17.01%. The company had revenue of $1.54 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.53 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the business earned $0.84 earnings per share. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 7.6% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, sell-side analysts forecast that NetApp, Inc. will post 5.71 earnings per share for the current year.

NetApp Announces Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, October 23rd. Investors of record on Friday, October 4th will be given a dividend of $0.52 per share. This represents a $2.08 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.75%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, October 4th. NetApp’s payout ratio is 44.83%.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On NetApp

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in NTAP. Hollencrest Capital Management bought a new stake in NetApp during the second quarter worth about $26,000. J.Safra Asset Management Corp lifted its stake in NetApp by 706.3% during the first quarter. J.Safra Asset Management Corp now owns 258 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $27,000 after purchasing an additional 226 shares during the last quarter. Northwest Investment Counselors LLC bought a new stake in NetApp during the third quarter worth about $27,000. New Covenant Trust Company N.A. bought a new stake in NetApp during the first quarter worth about $28,000. Finally, Redwood Wealth Management Group LLC bought a new stake in NetApp during the second quarter worth about $32,000. 92.17% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of research firms have recently weighed in on NTAP. UBS Group raised their target price on NetApp from $121.00 to $134.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday, August 29th. Stifel Nicolaus raised their target price on NetApp from $138.00 to $140.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, August 29th. Barclays raised their target price on NetApp from $116.00 to $119.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a report on Thursday, August 29th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted their price target on NetApp from $146.00 to $147.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday, August 29th. Finally, Bank of America lifted their price target on NetApp from $105.00 to $110.00 and gave the stock an “underperform” rating in a report on Thursday, August 29th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have given a hold rating and six have given a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $129.06.

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.