Cesar Cernuda Sells 22,000 Shares of NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) Stock

NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) President Cesar Cernuda sold 22,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, June 28th. The shares were sold at an average price of $129.46, for a total transaction of $2,848,120.00. Following the completion of the sale, the president now owns 64,789 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $8,387,583.94. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link.

NetApp Stock Up 0.3 %

NetApp stock opened at $130.26 on Thursday. NetApp, Inc. has a 52 week low of $70.82 and a 52 week high of $131.02. The firm has a market cap of $26.81 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 28.07, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 5.21 and a beta of 1.27. The business’s 50-day moving average price is $116.61 and its 200 day moving average price is $102.04. The company has a quick ratio of 1.15, a current ratio of 1.19 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.74.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, May 30th. The data storage provider reported $1.80 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.48 by $0.32. The firm had revenue of $1.67 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.65 billion. NetApp had a net margin of 15.73% and a return on equity of 114.54%. The business’s revenue was up 5.5% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $1.20 EPS. As a group, sell-side analysts anticipate that NetApp, Inc. will post 5.47 earnings per share for the current year.

NetApp Increases Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, July 24th. Stockholders of record on Friday, July 5th will be given a dividend of $0.52 per share. The ex-dividend date is Friday, July 5th. This is a boost from NetApp’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.50. This represents a $2.08 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.60%. NetApp’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 43.10%.

NetApp declared that its board has authorized a share repurchase program on Thursday, May 30th that allows the company to repurchase $1.00 billion in shares. This repurchase authorization allows the data storage provider to reacquire up to 4% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase programs are often a sign that the company’s management believes its stock is undervalued.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On NetApp

A number of hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the business. ORG Partners LLC lifted its position in shares of NetApp by 14,650.0% during the 4th quarter. ORG Partners LLC now owns 295 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $26,000 after buying an additional 293 shares in the last quarter. First Horizon Advisors Inc. lifted its holdings in NetApp by 58.7% during the fourth quarter. First Horizon Advisors Inc. now owns 311 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $27,000 after purchasing an additional 115 shares in the last quarter. Rise Advisors LLC purchased a new position in NetApp during the first quarter valued at $27,000. J.Safra Asset Management Corp grew its position in shares of NetApp by 706.3% in the first quarter. J.Safra Asset Management Corp now owns 258 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $27,000 after purchasing an additional 226 shares during the period. Finally, New Covenant Trust Company N.A. acquired a new stake in shares of NetApp in the first quarter valued at about $28,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 92.17% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of research firms have recently weighed in on NTAP. Wedbush reissued a “neutral” rating and issued a $120.00 price objective on shares of NetApp in a research report on Wednesday, June 12th. Morgan Stanley raised their price target on NetApp from $106.00 to $127.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Wednesday, June 12th. Argus upped their price objective on shares of NetApp from $130.00 to $140.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, June 5th. Bank of America increased their price objective on shares of NetApp from $85.00 to $100.00 and gave the company an “underperform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, May 29th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised shares of NetApp from an “underweight” rating to a “neutral” rating and boosted their target price for the stock from $95.00 to $125.00 in a research report on Friday, May 31st. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, eleven have issued a hold rating and six have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, NetApp has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $117.81.

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.