Eagle Asset Management Inc. Has $5.48 Million Holdings in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP)

Eagle Asset Management Inc. increased its stake in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) by 4.5% in the 3rd quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund owned 44,213 shares of the data storage provider’s stock after buying an additional 1,901 shares during the quarter. Eagle Asset Management Inc.’s holdings in NetApp were worth $5,483,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other large investors also recently made changes to their positions in NTAP. Acadian Asset Management LLC increased its position in NetApp by 17.5% during the 2nd quarter. Acadian Asset Management LLC now owns 2,791,599 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $359,517,000 after buying an additional 416,233 shares during the period. Legal & General Group Plc increased its position in NetApp by 3.5% during the 2nd quarter. Legal & General Group Plc now owns 2,405,363 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $309,811,000 after buying an additional 82,378 shares during the period. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP increased its position in NetApp by 12.8% during the 2nd quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 1,737,578 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $223,806,000 after buying an additional 196,952 shares during the period. AQR Capital Management LLC increased its position in NetApp by 59.6% during the 2nd quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 1,643,146 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $211,637,000 after buying an additional 613,583 shares during the period. Finally, Boston Partners grew its holdings in shares of NetApp by 3.1% during the 1st quarter. Boston Partners now owns 1,361,262 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $142,879,000 after purchasing an additional 41,011 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 92.17% of the company’s stock.

Insider Transactions at NetApp

In other news, CAO Lorenzo Daniel De sold 1,685 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, September 24th. The stock was sold at an average price of $123.60, for a total transaction of $208,266.00. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, Director Thomas Michael Nevens sold 3,333 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, November 18th. The stock was sold at an average price of $119.23, for a total value of $397,393.59. Following the transaction, the director now owns 9,277 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,106,096.71. This trade represents a 26.43 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 23,049 shares of company stock worth $2,807,851 over the last ninety days. 0.47% of the stock is owned by insiders.

NetApp Stock Performance

Shares of NTAP stock opened at $122.34 on Monday. The business’s 50-day moving average price is $121.87 and its 200-day moving average price is $122.69. NetApp, Inc. has a 12 month low of $77.56 and a 12 month high of $135.45. The firm has a market capitalization of $25.05 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 22.49, a PEG ratio of 3.26 and a beta of 1.24. The company has a current ratio of 0.96, a quick ratio of 0.91 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.34.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, November 21st. The data storage provider reported $1.87 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.78 by $0.09. NetApp had a return on equity of 119.68% and a net margin of 17.78%. The firm had revenue of $1.66 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.65 billion. During the same period last year, the firm posted $1.23 earnings per share. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 6.1% on a year-over-year basis. Equities research analysts forecast that NetApp, Inc. will post 5.71 EPS for the current year.

NetApp Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, January 22nd. Stockholders of record on Friday, January 3rd will be given a dividend of $0.52 per share. The ex-dividend date is Friday, January 3rd. This represents a $2.08 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.70%. NetApp’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 38.24%.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

NTAP has been the topic of several analyst reports. Susquehanna reissued a “positive” rating and set a $155.00 target price on shares of NetApp in a report on Monday, August 26th. Wells Fargo & Company increased their target price on NetApp from $135.00 to $140.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Friday. Stifel Nicolaus increased their target price on NetApp from $140.00 to $145.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Friday. Barclays increased their target price on NetApp from $119.00 to $132.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Friday. Finally, Morgan Stanley increased their target price on NetApp from $127.00 to $132.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Friday. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, eleven have issued a hold rating and six have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $134.00.

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.