Hsbc Holdings PLC Makes New Investment in F5, Inc. $FFIV

Hsbc Holdings PLC acquired a new stake in F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV) during the 2nd quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor acquired 499,823 shares of the network technology company’s stock, valued at approximately $208,277,000. Hsbc Holdings PLC owned approximately 0.88% of F5 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other large investors have also made changes to their positions in FFIV. BlackRock Inc. acquired a new stake in shares of F5 during the 2nd quarter worth about $2,611,637,000. Jericho Capital Asset Management L.P. purchased a new position in shares of F5 during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $579,699,000. Northwestern Mutual Wealth Management Co. boosted its position in F5 by 15,103.5% during the fourth quarter. Northwestern Mutual Wealth Management Co. now owns 1,170,216 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $298,709,000 after acquiring an additional 1,162,519 shares during the last quarter. First Trust Advisors LP boosted its position in F5 by 68.5% during the fourth quarter. First Trust Advisors LP now owns 2,753,652 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $702,897,000 after acquiring an additional 1,119,291 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Norges Bank purchased a new stake in F5 in the 4th quarter worth approximately $205,706,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 90.66% of the company’s stock.

F5 Trading Up 1.0%

NASDAQ:FFIV opened at $382.75 on Wednesday. The firm’s fifty day simple moving average is $403.35 and its 200 day simple moving average is $349.82. F5, Inc. has a twelve month low of $223.76 and a twelve month high of $435.00. The firm has a market capitalization of $21.68 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 30.47, a PEG ratio of 3.70 and a beta of 1.03.

F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) last released its quarterly earnings data on Monday, July 27th. The network technology company reported $4.73 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $4.00 by $0.73. The company had revenue of $865.08 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $834.60 million. F5 had a return on equity of 21.54% and a net margin of 21.95%.The firm’s revenue was up 10.9% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the company posted $4.16 earnings per share. F5 has set its Q4 2026 guidance at 4.140-4.260 EPS and its FY 2026 guidance at 17.210-17.330 EPS. On average, analysts predict that F5, Inc. will post 13.65 earnings per share for the current year.

Analyst Ratings Changes

FFIV has been the subject of several analyst reports. Weiss Ratings upgraded F5 from a “buy (b-)” rating to a “buy (b)” rating in a research note on Tuesday, August 11th. Bank of America raised their target price on shares of F5 from $250.00 to $300.00 and gave the stock an “underperform” rating in a research report on Tuesday, May 26th. Evercore raised shares of F5 from an “in-line” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $475.00 price target for the company in a research report on Monday, May 18th. Morgan Stanley increased their price target on shares of F5 from $380.00 to $415.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Tuesday, July 28th. Finally, Piper Sandler reiterated an “overweight” rating and issued a $461.00 price target (up from $423.00) on shares of F5 in a report on Tuesday, July 28th. Five equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, five have given a Hold rating and one has given a Sell rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $416.62.

Insider Activity

In other news, insider John Anthony Maddison sold 1,000 shares of F5 stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, August 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $405.85, for a total transaction of $405,850.00. Following the sale, the insider owned 1,353 shares in the company, valued at $549,115.05. This trade represents a 42.50% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, CFO Edward Cooper Werner sold 2,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, June 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $400.00, for a total transaction of $1,000,000.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer owned 406 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $162,400. This trade represents a 86.03% decrease in their ownership of the stock. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Insiders sold a total of 15,699 shares of company stock worth $6,316,411 in the last ninety days. 0.48% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

About F5

F5 Inc (NASDAQ:FFIV) specializes in application services and delivery networking, helping organizations ensure the availability, performance and security of their applications. The company’s core offerings include advanced load balancing, traffic management and application security solutions designed to optimize user experiences and protect against threats such as distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks and web application exploits.

At the heart of F5’s product portfolio is the BIG-IP platform, which provides a suite of software modules for local and global traffic management, secure web application firewalling and DNS service delivery.