Mather Group LLC. Trims Holdings in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP)

Mather Group LLC. cut its stake in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) by 4.2% in the 3rd quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 4,567 shares of the data storage provider’s stock after selling 200 shares during the quarter. Mather Group LLC.’s holdings in NetApp were worth $564,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Hollencrest Capital Management purchased a new position in shares of NetApp in the second quarter valued at $26,000. Redwood Wealth Management Group LLC purchased a new position in shares of NetApp in the second quarter valued at $32,000. J.Safra Asset Management Corp boosted its stake in NetApp by 706.3% during the first quarter. J.Safra Asset Management Corp now owns 258 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $27,000 after buying an additional 226 shares during the period. Rise Advisors LLC bought a new stake in NetApp during the first quarter valued at $27,000. Finally, New Covenant Trust Company N.A. bought a new stake in NetApp during the first quarter valued at $28,000. 92.17% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several research firms recently issued reports on NTAP. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their price objective on NetApp from $120.00 to $135.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, June 12th. Evercore ISI lifted their price objective on NetApp from $120.00 to $130.00 and gave the company an “in-line” rating in a research note on Monday, August 12th. Morgan Stanley lifted their price objective on NetApp from $106.00 to $127.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, June 12th. Citigroup lifted 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, Barclays lifted their price objective on NetApp from $116.00 to $119.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Thursday, August 29th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have given a hold rating and six have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $129.06.

Insider Buying and Selling at NetApp

In related news, CAO Lorenzo Daniel De sold 1,685 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on 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 is available at this link. In related news, CAO Lorenzo Daniel De sold 1,685 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on 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 is available at this link. Also, CEO George Kurian sold 8,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, July 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $130.36, for a total value of $1,108,060.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 314,274 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $40,968,758.64. This represents a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Corporate insiders own 0.37% of the company’s stock.

NetApp Stock Performance

Shares of NTAP stock opened at $127.27 on Thursday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.34, a quick ratio of 0.91 and a current ratio of 0.96. NetApp, Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $70.82 and a fifty-two week high of $135.01. The stock has a 50 day moving average price of $122.81 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $118.42. The company has a market capitalization of $26.19 billion, a P/E ratio of 27.43, a PEG ratio of 4.61 and a beta of 1.23.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, August 28th. The data storage provider reported $1.56 earnings per share for the quarter, beating 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 firm had revenue of $1.54 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.53 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $0.84 earnings per share. The business’s revenue was up 7.6% on a year-over-year basis. Analysts expect that NetApp, Inc. will post 5.71 earnings per share for the current year.

NetApp Announces Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, October 23rd. Shareholders of record on Friday, October 4th will be given a $0.52 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, October 4th. This represents a $2.08 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.63%. NetApp’s payout ratio is currently 44.83%.

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.