NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) Price Target Lowered to $130.00 at TD Cowen

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) had its price objective lowered by TD Cowen from $160.00 to $130.00 in a research report released on Friday, MarketBeat reports. The brokerage currently has a buy rating on the data storage provider’s stock.

NTAP has been the topic of a number of other research reports. 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. Morgan Stanley raised their target price on NetApp from $132.00 to $146.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a report on Tuesday, December 17th. StockNews.com raised NetApp from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, February 19th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised NetApp from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and set a $160.00 target price on the stock in a report on Monday, December 16th. Finally, Oppenheimer started coverage on NetApp in a report on Wednesday, November 13th. They issued a “market perform” rating on the stock. Twelve analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and six have given a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, NetApp has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $132.07.

NetApp Stock Performance

Shares of NASDAQ NTAP opened at $100.00 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.39, a quick ratio of 0.84 and a current ratio of 0.91. The firm has a market cap of $20.33 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 18.38, a P/E/G ratio of 2.45 and a beta of 1.23. The business’s 50-day simple moving average is $119.85 and its 200-day simple moving average is $121.86. NetApp has a 52 week low of $88.49 and a 52 week high of $135.45.

NetApp Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, April 23rd. Investors of record on Friday, April 4th will be given a dividend of $0.52 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, April 4th. This represents a $2.08 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.08%. NetApp’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 38.52%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, CEO George Kurian sold 8,500 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, December 16th. The stock was sold at an average price of $124.29, for a total transaction of $1,056,465.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 279,782 shares in the company, valued at $34,774,104.78. This trade represents a 2.95 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, President Cesar Cernuda sold 22,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, December 30th. The stock was sold at an average price of $114.99, for a total value of $2,529,780.00. Following the transaction, the president now owns 27,099 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $3,116,114.01. This trade represents a 44.81 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 60,903 shares of company stock worth $7,260,341 in the last 90 days. 0.47% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On NetApp

Several institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of the business. Park Square Financial Group LLC bought a new position in NetApp in the 4th quarter valued at $36,000. Universal Beteiligungs und Servicegesellschaft mbH bought a new position in NetApp in the 4th quarter valued at $38,040,000. Azzad Asset Management Inc. ADV raised its position in NetApp by 2.9% in the 4th quarter. Azzad Asset Management Inc. ADV now owns 19,907 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $2,311,000 after purchasing an additional 565 shares during the last quarter. ABLE Financial Group LLC raised its position in NetApp by 36.1% in the 4th quarter. ABLE Financial Group LLC now owns 12,674 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $1,471,000 after purchasing an additional 3,363 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Integrated Advisors Network LLC raised its position in NetApp by 602.8% in the 4th quarter. Integrated Advisors Network LLC now owns 29,391 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $3,412,000 after purchasing an additional 25,209 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors 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.