Northland Securities Raises NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) Price Target to $120.00

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) had its price objective lifted by Northland Securities from $108.00 to $120.00 in a report issued on Friday,Benzinga reports. The brokerage currently has a market perform rating on the data storage provider’s stock.

NTAP has been the subject of several other reports. Citigroup raised their target price on shares of NetApp from $120.00 to $130.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Thursday, August 15th. Loop Capital raised shares of NetApp from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and raised their target price for the stock from $121.00 to $150.00 in a research report on Tuesday, September 3rd. Wedbush reaffirmed a “neutral” rating and issued a $120.00 target price on shares of NetApp in a research report on Monday, August 26th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted their price target on shares of NetApp from $146.00 to $147.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Thursday, August 29th. Finally, Evercore ISI lifted their price target on shares of NetApp from $120.00 to $130.00 and gave the company an “in-line” rating in a research report on Monday, August 12th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, eleven have issued a hold rating and six have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, NetApp currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $134.00.

NetApp Trading Down 3.4 %

Shares of NTAP opened at $122.34 on Friday. The stock has a market capitalization of $25.05 billion, a P/E ratio of 22.49, a PEG 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. The firm has a fifty day simple moving average of $121.87 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $122.49. NetApp has a twelve month low of $77.56 and a twelve month high of $135.45.

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

NetApp Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, January 22nd. Shareholders of record on Friday, January 3rd will be paid 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 yield of 1.70%. NetApp’s dividend payout ratio is currently 38.24%.

Insider Buying and Selling at NetApp

In other news, CEO George Kurian sold 8,500 shares of NetApp 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 in the company, valued at $36,922,233.58. The trade was a 2.82 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Also, EVP Elizabeth M. O’callahan sold 705 shares of NetApp 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 sale, the executive vice president now owns 11,694 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,475,782.80. This represents a 5.69 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last ninety days, insiders sold 23,049 shares of company stock worth $2,807,851. 0.47% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On NetApp

Institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the business. Hollencrest Capital Management purchased a new position in shares of NetApp in the second quarter worth approximately $26,000. Northwest Investment Counselors LLC purchased a new position in NetApp during the third quarter valued at approximately $27,000. New Covenant Trust Company N.A. purchased a new position in NetApp during the first quarter valued at approximately $28,000. Redwood Wealth Management Group LLC purchased a new position in NetApp during the second quarter valued at approximately $32,000. Finally, True Wealth Design LLC lifted its holdings in NetApp by 2,833.3% during the third 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. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 92.17% of the company’s stock.

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.