Daiwa Securities Group Inc. Has $5.23 Million Stock Holdings in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP)

Daiwa Securities Group Inc. increased its stake in shares of NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) by 20.9% during the 3rd quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 42,302 shares of the data storage provider’s stock after buying an additional 7,318 shares during the period. Daiwa Securities Group Inc.’s holdings in NetApp were worth $5,225,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Intech Investment Management LLC lifted its position in shares of NetApp by 8.9% during the third quarter. Intech Investment Management LLC now owns 302,010 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $37,301,000 after purchasing an additional 24,651 shares in the last quarter. The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company increased its holdings in shares of NetApp by 4.7% in the second quarter. The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company now owns 186,777 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $24,057,000 after purchasing an additional 8,305 shares in the last quarter. Legal & General Group Plc raised its position in NetApp by 3.5% in the 2nd quarter. Legal & General Group Plc now owns 2,405,363 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $309,811,000 after purchasing an additional 82,378 shares during the last quarter. Cetera Investment Advisers lifted its holdings in NetApp by 132.1% during the 1st quarter. Cetera Investment Advisers now owns 28,230 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $2,963,000 after buying an additional 16,066 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Hilton Capital Management LLC bought a new position in NetApp in the 3rd quarter valued at $4,059,000. Institutional investors own 92.17% of the company’s stock.

NetApp Stock Performance

NTAP stock opened at $129.60 on Wednesday. NetApp, Inc. has a 1-year low of $77.56 and a 1-year high of $135.45. The business’s 50-day moving average price is $122.25 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $122.96. The firm has a market cap of $26.54 billion, a PE ratio of 23.82, a P/E/G ratio of 3.15 and a beta of 1.24. The company has a current ratio of 0.91, a quick ratio of 0.84 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.39.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, November 21st. The data storage provider reported $1.87 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.78 by $0.09. The business had revenue of $1.66 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.65 billion. NetApp had a return on equity of 123.63% and a net margin of 17.78%. NetApp’s quarterly revenue was up 6.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $1.23 EPS. As a group, research analysts forecast that NetApp, Inc. will post 5.71 earnings per share for the current year.

NetApp Announces Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, January 22nd. Investors of record on Friday, January 3rd will be issued a dividend of $0.52 per share. The ex-dividend date is Friday, January 3rd. This represents a $2.08 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.60%. NetApp’s payout ratio is 38.24%.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities research analysts have recently weighed in on the company. Northland Securities upped their price target on NetApp from $108.00 to $120.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a research note on Friday, November 22nd. UBS Group upped their target price on shares of NetApp from $121.00 to $134.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Thursday, August 29th. Morgan Stanley raised their target price on shares of NetApp from $127.00 to $132.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Friday, November 22nd. Barclays boosted 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, November 22nd. Finally, TD Cowen raised their price objective on shares of NetApp from $145.00 to $160.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, November 22nd. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, eleven have assigned a hold rating and six have given a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $134.00.

Insider Activity at NetApp

In related news, CAO Lorenzo Daniel De sold 326 shares of NetApp stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, November 18th. The stock was sold at an average price of $117.44, for a total value of $38,285.44. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, CEO George Kurian sold 8,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, October 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $126.11, for a total value of $1,071,935.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 292,778 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $36,922,233.58. This trade represents a 2.82 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last ninety days, insiders have sold 23,049 shares of company stock valued at $2,807,851. 0.47% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

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.