NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) CEO George Kurian Sells 8,500 Shares

NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) CEO George Kurian sold 8,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, January 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $123.03, for a total value of $1,045,755.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 271,282 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $33,375,824.46. The trade was a 3.04 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink.

George Kurian also recently made the following trade(s):

• On Monday, December 16th, George Kurian sold 8,500 shares of NetApp stock. The shares were sold at an average price of $124.29, for a total value of $1,056,465.00.
• On Monday, November 18th, George Kurian sold 8,500 shares of NetApp stock. The stock was sold at an average price of $118.00, for a total transaction of $1,003,000.00.

NetApp Trading Up 0.2 %

Shares of NASDAQ NTAP opened at $126.30 on Friday. The firm has a 50 day moving average price of $121.07 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $122.69. The stock has a market cap of $25.68 billion, a P/E ratio of 23.22, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.93 and a beta of 1.23. NetApp, Inc. has a 52-week low of $83.80 and a 52-week high of $135.45. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.39, a quick ratio of 0.84 and a current ratio of 0.91.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, November 21st. The data storage provider reported $1.87 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping 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 revenue for the quarter was up 6.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the company earned $1.23 EPS. As a group, equities analysts forecast that NetApp, Inc. will post 5.89 EPS for the current year.

NetApp Dividend Announcement

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, January 22nd. Investors of record on Friday, January 3rd were issued a $0.52 dividend. This represents a $2.08 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.65%. The ex-dividend date was Friday, January 3rd. NetApp’s payout ratio is presently 38.24%.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of analysts have recently weighed in on the stock. Morgan Stanley upped their price target on shares of NetApp from $132.00 to $146.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Tuesday, December 17th. Stifel Nicolaus raised their target price on NetApp from $140.00 to $145.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, November 22nd. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upgraded NetApp from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and set a $160.00 price target on the stock in a research note on Monday, December 16th. Bank of America raised their price objective on NetApp from $115.00 to $121.00 and gave the company an “underperform” rating in a research note on Friday, November 22nd. Finally, StockNews.com downgraded NetApp from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Monday. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have issued a hold rating and six have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the company has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $139.20.

Institutional Trading of NetApp

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. KBC Group NV boosted its stake in shares of NetApp by 276.9% in the 4th quarter. KBC Group NV now owns 891,033 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $103,431,000 after purchasing an additional 654,626 shares during the last quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC lifted its holdings in NetApp by 59.6% in the second quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 1,643,146 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $211,637,000 after buying an additional 613,583 shares during the period. Geode Capital Management LLC boosted its position in NetApp by 8.2% during the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 5,985,673 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $738,280,000 after acquiring an additional 453,324 shares during the last quarter. APG Asset Management US Inc. acquired a new stake in NetApp during the 2nd quarter worth about $48,074,000. Finally, Robeco Institutional Asset Management B.V. raised its position in shares of NetApp by 38.5% in the 3rd quarter. Robeco Institutional Asset Management B.V. now owns 1,232,852 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $152,270,000 after acquiring an additional 342,415 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 92.17% of the company’s stock.

About NetApp

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.