Ameriprise Financial Inc. Sells 194,998 Shares of NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP)

Ameriprise Financial Inc. lowered its position in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) by 3.7% during the 2nd quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 5,059,727 shares of the data storage provider’s stock after selling 194,998 shares during the period. Ameriprise Financial Inc. owned 2.46% of NetApp worth $651,693,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. First Trust Advisors LP lifted its holdings in shares of NetApp by 57.5% in the 4th quarter. First Trust Advisors LP now owns 5,643,780 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $497,556,000 after purchasing an additional 2,059,574 shares in the last quarter. Acadian Asset Management LLC raised its holdings in NetApp by 17.5% during the second 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 last quarter. Los Angeles Capital Management LLC grew its holdings in shares of NetApp by 254.8% during the first quarter. Los Angeles Capital Management LLC now owns 2,304,512 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $241,905,000 after buying an additional 1,654,942 shares during the last quarter. TD Asset Management Inc grew its holdings in shares of NetApp by 26.5% during the first quarter. TD Asset Management Inc now owns 2,148,540 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $225,532,000 after buying an additional 450,263 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Epoch Investment Partners Inc. increased its position in shares of NetApp by 11.9% during the first quarter. Epoch Investment Partners Inc. now owns 1,982,787 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $208,133,000 after acquiring an additional 211,204 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 92.17% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

NTAP has been the subject of a number of analyst reports. Stifel Nicolaus lifted their price target on NetApp from $138.00 to $140.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, August 29th. Morgan Stanley lifted their target price on NetApp from $106.00 to $127.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, June 12th. Susquehanna reissued a “positive” rating and issued a $155.00 price target on shares of NetApp in a research report on Monday, August 26th. Citigroup raised their price objective on NetApp from $120.00 to $130.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday, August 15th. Finally, Bank of America upped their target price on shares of NetApp from $105.00 to $110.00 and gave the stock an “underperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, August 29th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have assigned a hold rating and six have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, NetApp presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $129.06.

NetApp Price Performance

NetApp stock opened at $124.45 on Friday. The business’s 50 day simple moving average is $123.31 and its 200 day simple moving average is $117.04. NetApp, Inc. has a 12 month low of $70.82 and a 12 month high of $135.01. The company has a market cap of $25.61 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 26.82, a PEG ratio of 4.61 and a beta of 1.23. 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 posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, August 28th. The data storage provider reported $1.56 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.45 by $0.11. NetApp had a return on equity of 121.41% and a net margin of 17.01%. The company had revenue of $1.54 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.53 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company earned $0.84 EPS. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 7.6% compared to the same quarter last year. Sell-side analysts forecast that NetApp, Inc. will post 5.71 EPS for the current year.

NetApp Dividend Announcement

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, October 23rd. Shareholders of record on Friday, October 4th will be given a dividend of $0.52 per share. The ex-dividend date is Friday, October 4th. This represents a $2.08 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.67%. NetApp’s dividend payout ratio is currently 44.83%.

NetApp declared that its board has approved a stock buyback program on Thursday, May 30th that allows the company to buyback $1.00 billion in shares. This buyback authorization allows the data storage provider to purchase up to 4% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback programs are typically an indication that the company’s leadership believes its shares are undervalued.

Insider Transactions at NetApp

In related news, CAO Lorenzo Daniel De sold 1,685 shares of the 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 legal filing with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. In related news, CAO Lorenzo Daniel De sold 1,685 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, September 24th. The shares were sold at an average price of $123.60, for a total transaction of $208,266.00. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this link. Also, CEO George Kurian sold 8,500 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, July 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $130.36, for a total transaction of $1,108,060.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 314,274 shares in the company, valued at $40,968,758.64. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 10,637 shares of company stock valued at $1,376,474 over the last three months. Company insiders own 0.37% of the company’s stock.

NetApp 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.