F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) Price Target Raised to $360.00

F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) had its price target upped by Needham & Company LLC from $285.00 to $360.00 in a report published on Wednesday,Benzinga reports. The brokerage currently has a buy rating on the network technology company’s stock.

Several other brokerages also recently commented on FFIV. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upped their target price on shares of F5 from $225.00 to $250.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Tuesday, October 29th. StockNews.com upgraded shares of F5 from a “buy” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, October 29th. Piper Sandler lifted their target price on F5 from $186.00 to $246.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Tuesday, October 29th. Evercore ISI boosted 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. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada raised their price target on F5 from $240.00 to $260.00 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a research report on Friday, January 3rd. Seven analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, one has issued a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $299.38.

F5 Trading Up 11.4 %

NASDAQ FFIV opened at $300.46 on Wednesday. F5 has a 12 month low of $159.01 and a 12 month high of $308.00. The stock has a 50-day simple moving average of $258.11 and a 200 day simple moving average of $226.55. The company has a market capitalization of $17.61 billion, a PE ratio of 31.43, a P/E/G ratio of 3.68 and a beta of 1.06.

F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Monday, October 28th. The network technology company reported $3.67 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.45 by $0.22. The company had revenue of $747.00 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $730.43 million. F5 had a return on equity of 20.80% and a net margin of 20.13%. During the same period in the prior year, the business posted $2.76 EPS. F5’s revenue was up 5.7% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, sell-side analysts predict that F5 will post 11.01 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

F5 declared that its board has authorized a stock repurchase program on Monday, October 28th that permits the company to buyback $1.00 billion in shares. This buyback authorization permits the network technology company to repurchase up to 7.9% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares buyback programs are usually a sign that the company’s board of directors believes its shares are undervalued.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, Director Alan Higginson sold 825 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, November 19th. The shares were sold at an average price of $239.77, for a total value of $197,810.25. Following the sale, the director now owns 9,882 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,369,407.14. The trade was a 7.71 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. 0.58% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On F5

Several institutional investors and hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the business. Northwest Investment Counselors LLC bought a new position in shares of F5 in the 3rd quarter valued at about $28,000. Kathleen S. Wright Associates Inc. acquired a new position in F5 during the third quarter valued at approximately $32,000. Friedenthal Financial acquired a new position in F5 during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $50,000. Brown Financial Advisors bought a new position in F5 in the second quarter valued at approximately $66,000. Finally, Venturi Wealth Management LLC increased its position in shares of F5 by 79.8% during the 3rd quarter. Venturi Wealth Management LLC now owns 320 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $70,000 after purchasing an additional 142 shares during the last quarter. 90.66% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

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.