F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV) Short Interest Update

F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV) was the recipient of a large drop in short interest in November. As of November 15th, there was short interest totalling 2,090,000 shares, a drop of 9.9% from the October 31st total of 2,320,000 shares. Based on an average daily trading volume, of 632,300 shares, the days-to-cover ratio is currently 3.3 days. Currently, 3.6% of the shares of the stock are sold short.

Insider Activity

In related news, CFO Francis J. Pelzer sold 600 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, September 20th. The shares were sold at an average price of $217.50, for a total transaction of $130,500.00. Following the transaction, the chief financial officer now owns 30,425 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $6,617,437.50. This trade represents a 1.93 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this link. Also, CEO Francois Locoh-Donou sold 1,450 shares of F5 stock in a transaction on Thursday, October 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $218.26, for a total transaction of $316,477.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 121,122 shares in the company, valued at approximately $26,436,087.72. The trade was a 1.18 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last quarter, insiders have sold 4,475 shares of company stock worth $977,039. 0.58% of the stock is currently 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 stock. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD grew its holdings in shares of F5 by 1.0% in the first quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 80,292 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $15,224,000 after acquiring an additional 811 shares during the period. Janus Henderson Group PLC lifted its stake in shares of F5 by 195.1% in the 1st quarter. Janus Henderson Group PLC now owns 21,994 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $4,170,000 after purchasing an additional 14,541 shares during the period. Cetera Advisors LLC purchased a new position in shares of F5 in the first quarter worth approximately $299,000. DekaBank Deutsche Girozentrale grew its position in F5 by 55.6% during the first quarter. DekaBank Deutsche Girozentrale now owns 57,361 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $10,775,000 after buying an additional 20,486 shares during the period. Finally, GAMMA Investing LLC raised its position in F5 by 11.7% in the second quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 942 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $162,000 after acquiring an additional 99 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 90.66% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several equities research analysts recently weighed in on FFIV shares. Morgan Stanley increased their target price on F5 from $215.00 to $230.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a report on Tuesday, October 29th. Barclays increased their price objective on F5 from $214.00 to $246.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Tuesday, October 29th. The Goldman Sachs Group lifted their target price on shares of F5 from $212.00 to $241.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Tuesday, October 29th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased their price objective on F5 from $225.00 to $250.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Tuesday, October 29th. Finally, StockNews.com raised shares of F5 from a “buy” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, October 29th. Seven analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, two have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $233.56.

F5 Trading Down 0.4 %

NASDAQ:FFIV traded down $1.01 on Tuesday, reaching $251.13. 385,494 shares of the stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 532,420. The company has a market capitalization of $14.72 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 26.27, a PEG ratio of 3.41 and a beta of 1.06. F5 has a 12 month low of $159.01 and a 12 month high of $253.62. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $230.67 and its 200 day simple moving average is $200.39.

F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Monday, October 28th. The network technology company reported $3.67 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.45 by $0.22. The company had revenue of $747.00 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $730.43 million. F5 had a net margin of 20.13% and a return on equity of 20.80%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 5.7% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter last year, the firm earned $2.76 earnings per share. Equities analysts anticipate that F5 will post 11.01 EPS for the current fiscal year.

F5 announced that its Board of Directors has approved a share repurchase program on Monday, October 28th that authorizes the company to repurchase $1.00 billion in shares. This repurchase authorization authorizes the network technology company to repurchase up to 7.9% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock repurchase programs are usually a sign that the company’s leadership believes its stock is undervalued.

About F5

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.