State of New Jersey Common Pension Fund D Cuts Holdings in F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV)

State of New Jersey Common Pension Fund D lowered its stake in shares of F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV) by 24.3% in the second quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 21,189 shares of the network technology company’s stock after selling 6,798 shares during the period. State of New Jersey Common Pension Fund D’s holdings in F5 were worth $3,649,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also modified their holdings of the company. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP boosted its position in F5 by 10.6% during the fourth quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 517,948 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $92,704,000 after acquiring an additional 49,562 shares during the last quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. raised its stake in shares of F5 by 14.3% in the 4th quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 87,325 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $15,629,000 after acquiring an additional 10,948 shares during the period. Vanguard Personalized Indexing Management LLC raised its stake in shares of F5 by 31.4% in the 4th quarter. Vanguard Personalized Indexing Management LLC now owns 4,174 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $747,000 after acquiring an additional 997 shares during the period. Quadrant Capital Group LLC raised its stake in shares of F5 by 33.0% in the 4th quarter. Quadrant Capital Group LLC now owns 754 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $135,000 after acquiring an additional 187 shares during the period. Finally, Panagora Asset Management Inc. purchased a new stake in F5 during the 4th quarter worth approximately $206,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 90.66% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of brokerages have commented on FFIV. Barclays increased their price objective on shares of F5 from $189.00 to $214.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Tuesday, July 30th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased their price target on shares of F5 from $210.00 to $215.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Tuesday, July 30th. Royal Bank of Canada increased their price target on shares of F5 from $182.00 to $205.00 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a research note on Tuesday, July 30th. StockNews.com downgraded shares of F5 from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, September 10th. Finally, Piper Sandler increased their price target on shares of F5 from $167.00 to $186.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Tuesday, July 30th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, six have given a hold rating and three have given a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company presently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $200.89.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, CFO Francis J. Pelzer sold 500 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, June 20th. The shares were sold at an average price of $170.00, for a total value of $85,000.00. Following the sale, the chief financial officer now owns 31,608 shares in the company, valued at $5,373,360. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. In related news, Director Alan Higginson sold 1,000 shares of F5 stock in a transaction dated Monday, September 9th. The stock was sold at an average price of $201.65, for a total value of $201,650.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director now directly owns 10,707 shares in the company, valued at $2,159,066.55. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. Also, CFO Francis J. Pelzer sold 500 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, June 20th. The stock was sold at an average price of $170.00, for a total value of $85,000.00. Following the transaction, the chief financial officer now owns 31,608 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $5,373,360. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 7,771 shares of company stock valued at $1,463,205 over the last 90 days. 0.58% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

F5 Stock Up 0.6 %

FFIV stock opened at $214.64 on Wednesday. The company has a market capitalization of $12.58 billion, a P/E ratio of 25.71, a PEG ratio of 2.55 and a beta of 1.06. The company has a 50-day simple moving average of $191.24 and a 200 day simple moving average of $182.72. F5, Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $145.45 and a fifty-two week high of $216.00.

F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) last issued its earnings results on Monday, July 29th. The network technology company reported $3.36 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.97 by $0.39. The company had revenue of $695.50 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $686.06 million. F5 had a return on equity of 21.03% and a net margin of 19.94%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was down 1.0% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company earned $2.46 EPS. Equities analysts anticipate that F5, Inc. will post 10.18 EPS for the current year.

F5 Profile

F5, Inc provides multi-cloud application security and delivery solutions in the United States, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and the Asia Pacific region. The company’s distributed cloud services enable its customers to deploy, secure, and operate applications in any architecture, from on-premises to the public cloud.