Traders Buy Large Volume of NetApp Call Options (NASDAQ:NTAP)

NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) was the recipient of some unusual options trading activity on Thursday. Traders acquired 12,474 call options on the stock. This is an increase of 251% compared to the average daily volume of 3,554 call options.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several research analysts recently weighed in on the stock. Citigroup boosted their price target on shares of NetApp from $130.00 to $135.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday, November 22nd. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised NetApp from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and set a $160.00 price target for the company in a research report on Monday, December 16th. Wedbush reissued a “neutral” rating and issued a $120.00 price objective on shares of NetApp in a research report on Friday, November 22nd. Stifel Nicolaus lifted their target price on NetApp from $140.00 to $145.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, November 22nd. Finally, Northland Securities increased their price target on shares of NetApp from $108.00 to $120.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a research report on Friday, November 22nd. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have given a hold rating and seven have given a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $139.20.

NetApp Trading Up 0.9 %

Shares of NTAP opened at $116.94 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.39, a current ratio of 0.91 and a quick ratio of 0.84. NetApp has a 1-year low of $83.62 and a 1-year high of $135.45. The company has a market capitalization of $23.77 billion, a P/E ratio of 21.50, a P/E/G ratio of 2.92 and a beta of 1.23. The firm’s 50 day simple moving average is $121.15 and its 200 day simple moving average is $123.64.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, November 21st. The data storage provider reported $1.87 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.78 by $0.09. NetApp had a net margin of 17.78% and a return on equity of 123.63%. The company had revenue of $1.66 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.65 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $1.23 EPS. The firm’s revenue was up 6.1% compared to the same quarter last year. Sell-side analysts forecast that NetApp will post 5.83 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

NetApp Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, January 22nd. Shareholders of record on Friday, January 3rd will be paid a $0.52 dividend. This represents a $2.08 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.78%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, January 3rd. NetApp’s dividend payout ratio is currently 38.24%.

Insider Buying and Selling at NetApp

In other news, CAO Lorenzo Daniel De sold 326 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, November 18th. The stock was sold at an average price of $117.44, for a total value of $38,285.44. 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 NetApp stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, November 18th. The shares were sold at an average price of $119.23, for a total value of $397,393.59. Following the transaction, the director now directly owns 9,277 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,106,096.71. The trade was a 26.43 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last ninety days, insiders sold 51,864 shares of company stock valued at $6,185,830. Corporate insiders own 0.47% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the business. Intech Investment Management LLC boosted its position in NetApp by 8.9% during the third quarter. Intech Investment Management LLC now owns 302,010 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $37,301,000 after buying an additional 24,651 shares during the period. Daiwa Securities Group Inc. grew its position in NetApp by 20.9% during the 3rd quarter. Daiwa Securities Group Inc. now owns 42,302 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $5,225,000 after acquiring an additional 7,318 shares during the last quarter. The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company lifted its position in NetApp by 4.7% in the second quarter. The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company now owns 186,777 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $24,057,000 after purchasing an additional 8,305 shares during the last quarter. Hilton Capital Management LLC purchased a new stake in shares of NetApp during the third quarter valued at approximately $4,059,000. Finally, National Bank of Canada FI grew its holdings in shares of NetApp by 202.1% in the third quarter. National Bank of Canada FI now owns 266,262 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $32,886,000 after purchasing an additional 178,135 shares during the last quarter. 92.17% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

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.