Stifel Financial Corp Cuts Stock Position in F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV)

Stifel Financial Corp lessened its stake in F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV) by 8.9% in the 3rd quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The firm owned 2,503 shares of the network technology company’s stock after selling 244 shares during the quarter. Stifel Financial Corp’s holdings in F5 were worth $551,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other large investors have also bought and sold shares of the company. Pacer Advisors Inc. boosted its holdings in shares of F5 by 6,700.2% during the 2nd quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. now owns 848,388 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $146,118,000 after acquiring an additional 835,912 shares during the last quarter. Wedge Capital Management L L P NC bought a new stake in F5 in the 3rd quarter worth approximately $61,386,000. Los Angeles Capital Management LLC raised its stake in F5 by 1,681.1% during the 3rd quarter. Los Angeles Capital Management LLC now owns 285,639 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $62,898,000 after buying an additional 269,602 shares during the last quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC increased its position in F5 by 48.9% during the second quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 652,972 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $111,932,000 after acquiring an additional 214,351 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Hotchkis & Wiley Capital Management LLC lifted its holdings in F5 by 3.6% in the third quarter. Hotchkis & Wiley Capital Management LLC now owns 5,489,388 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $1,208,763,000 after acquiring an additional 191,020 shares during the period. 90.66% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities research analysts have issued reports on the company. The Goldman Sachs Group boosted their price target on F5 from $212.00 to $241.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Tuesday, October 29th. Morgan Stanley boosted their price target on F5 from $230.00 to $262.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a report on Tuesday, December 17th. Royal Bank of Canada increased their target price on shares of F5 from $205.00 to $240.00 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a report on Tuesday, October 29th. Barclays lifted their price target on shares of F5 from $214.00 to $246.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a report on Tuesday, October 29th. Finally, Piper Sandler increased their price objective on shares of F5 from $186.00 to $246.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Tuesday, October 29th. Seven equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, two have assigned a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $237.11.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other F5 news, CFO Francis J. Pelzer sold 600 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, October 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $217.67, for a total value of $130,602.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief financial officer now owns 29,825 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $6,492,007.75. This trade represents a 1.97 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, CEO Francois Locoh-Donou sold 1,450 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, October 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $218.26, for a total value of $316,477.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 121,122 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $26,436,087.72. This trade represents a 1.18 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 2,875 shares of company stock valued at $644,889 over the last ninety days. 0.58% of the stock is owned by insiders.

F5 Price Performance

Shares of FFIV opened at $257.12 on Friday. The stock has a market capitalization of $15.07 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 26.90, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.52 and a beta of 1.06. The business’s 50 day simple moving average is $243.96 and its 200-day simple moving average is $210.85. F5, Inc. has a 1 year low of $159.01 and a 1 year high of $264.50.

F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) last posted its earnings results on Monday, October 28th. The network technology company reported $3.67 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.45 by $0.22. The firm had revenue of $747.00 million for 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 business’s quarterly revenue was up 5.7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $2.76 EPS. On average, sell-side analysts expect that F5, Inc. will post 11.01 earnings per share for the current year.

F5 declared that its board has approved a stock buyback program on Monday, October 28th that authorizes the company to repurchase $1.00 billion in outstanding shares. This repurchase authorization authorizes the network technology company to reacquire up to 7.9% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase programs are often a sign that the company’s board of directors believes its stock is undervalued.

F5 Company Profile

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.