Asset Management One Co. Ltd. Grows Stock Position in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP)

Asset Management One Co. Ltd. grew its position in shares of NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) by 0.2% during the third quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 115,329 shares of the data storage provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 208 shares during the period. Asset Management One Co. Ltd.’s holdings in NetApp were worth $14,244,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other institutional investors have also made changes to their positions in NTAP. National Pension Service lifted its holdings in NetApp by 10.4% in the 3rd quarter. National Pension Service now owns 436,165 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $53,871,000 after buying an additional 41,250 shares in the last quarter. Robeco Institutional Asset Management B.V. boosted its holdings in 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 purchasing an additional 342,415 shares during the last quarter. Van ECK Associates Corp grew its stake in NetApp by 10.5% during the 3rd quarter. Van ECK Associates Corp now owns 45,402 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $5,403,000 after purchasing an additional 4,303 shares in the last quarter. Confluence Wealth Services Inc. increased its holdings in NetApp by 17.5% during the 3rd quarter. Confluence Wealth Services Inc. now owns 5,817 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $718,000 after purchasing an additional 867 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Janney Montgomery Scott LLC raised its position in shares of NetApp by 111.0% in the 3rd quarter. Janney Montgomery Scott LLC now owns 12,673 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $1,565,000 after purchasing an additional 6,666 shares in the last quarter. 92.17% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

NetApp Stock Performance

Shares of NTAP opened at $121.13 on Thursday. The firm has a fifty day moving average of $120.87 and a 200-day moving average of $120.98. The company has a market cap of $24.81 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 23.66, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 4.33 and a beta of 1.24. 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 1 year low of $74.82 and a 1 year high of $135.01.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, August 28th. The data storage provider reported $1.56 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.45 by $0.11. NetApp had a net margin of 17.01% and a return on equity of 121.41%. The firm had revenue of $1.54 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.53 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $0.84 EPS. NetApp’s revenue was up 7.6% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, equities analysts anticipate that NetApp, Inc. will post 5.71 earnings per share for the current year.

NetApp Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, October 23rd. Shareholders of record on Friday, October 4th were paid a dividend of $0.52 per share. This represents a $2.08 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.72%. The ex-dividend date was Friday, October 4th. NetApp’s payout ratio is currently 40.63%.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of research firms have recently weighed in on NTAP. Evercore ISI raised their price target on shares of NetApp from $120.00 to $130.00 and gave the stock an “in-line” rating in a research report on Monday, August 12th. Bank of America boosted their target price on shares of NetApp from $105.00 to $110.00 and gave the stock an “underperform” rating in a research report on Thursday, August 29th. UBS Group increased their price target on shares of NetApp from $121.00 to $134.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Thursday, August 29th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted their price objective on NetApp from $146.00 to $147.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday, August 29th. Finally, Loop Capital raised NetApp from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and increased their target price for the stock from $121.00 to $150.00 in a report on Tuesday, September 3rd. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have given a hold rating and six have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $129.06.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, CAO Lorenzo Daniel De sold 1,685 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction 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 document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. In other news, CEO George Kurian sold 8,500 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, October 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $126.11, for a total value of $1,071,935.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 292,778 shares in the company, valued at $36,922,233.58. This trade represents a 0.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this link. Also, CAO Lorenzo Daniel De sold 1,685 shares of the firm’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 disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last quarter, insiders sold 10,890 shares of company stock worth $1,369,172. 0.47% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

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.