State of Alaska Department of Revenue Lowers Position in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP)

State of Alaska Department of Revenue decreased its stake in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) by 40.3% in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 27,179 shares of the data storage provider’s stock after selling 18,373 shares during the quarter. State of Alaska Department of Revenue’s holdings in NetApp were worth $3,154,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in NTAP. KBC Group NV lifted its stake in shares of NetApp by 276.9% during the 4th quarter. KBC Group NV now owns 891,033 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $103,431,000 after buying an additional 654,626 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC lifted its position in shares of NetApp by 8.2% in 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 in the last quarter. Robeco Institutional Asset Management B.V. lifted its position in shares of NetApp by 38.5% in the third quarter. Robeco Institutional Asset Management B.V. now owns 1,232,852 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $152,270,000 after acquiring an additional 342,415 shares in the last quarter. Unigestion Holding SA boosted its stake in shares of NetApp by 926.1% in the third quarter. Unigestion Holding SA now owns 283,674 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $35,022,000 after acquiring an additional 256,028 shares during the period. Finally, Retirement Systems of Alabama raised its stake in NetApp by 546.8% during the 4th quarter. Retirement Systems of Alabama now owns 289,504 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $33,606,000 after purchasing an additional 244,746 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 92.17% of the company’s stock.

NetApp Trading Down 0.9 %

NTAP opened at $122.91 on Monday. NetApp, Inc. has a one year low of $83.80 and a one year 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. The stock has a market cap of $24.99 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 22.59, a P/E/G ratio of 2.94 and a beta of 1.23. The stock’s 50 day moving average price is $120.99 and its 200-day moving average price is $122.07.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last released its earnings results on Thursday, November 21st. The data storage provider reported $1.87 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.78 by $0.09. The business had revenue of $1.66 billion for 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%. The business’s revenue was up 6.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter last year, the firm posted $1.23 earnings per share. On average, equities analysts forecast that NetApp, Inc. will post 5.89 EPS for the current year.

NetApp Announces Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, January 22nd. Shareholders of record on Friday, January 3rd were given a $0.52 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Friday, January 3rd. This represents a $2.08 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.69%. NetApp’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 38.24%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, President Cesar Cernuda sold 22,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, December 30th. The stock was sold at an average price of $114.99, for a total transaction of $2,529,780.00. Following the transaction, the president now owns 27,099 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,116,114.01. This represents a 44.81 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. Also, CEO George Kurian sold 8,500 shares of NetApp stock in a transaction dated Monday, December 16th. The shares were sold at an average price of $124.29, for a total value of $1,056,465.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 279,782 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $34,774,104.78. The trade was a 2.95 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 64,110 shares of company stock worth $7,632,601 in the last three months. Corporate insiders own 0.47% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several research analysts have weighed in on the company. Citigroup upped their price target on NetApp from $130.00 to $135.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Friday, November 22nd. Barclays upped their target price on shares of NetApp from $119.00 to $132.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Friday, November 22nd. Stifel Nicolaus lifted their price target on shares of NetApp from $140.00 to $145.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, November 22nd. Bank of America increased their price objective on shares of NetApp from $115.00 to $121.00 and gave the company an “underperform” rating in a report on Friday, November 22nd. Finally, Oppenheimer initiated coverage on NetApp in a report on Wednesday, November 13th. They issued a “market perform” rating on the stock. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have issued a hold rating and seven have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $139.20.

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.