NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) Shares Purchased by Mediolanum International Funds Ltd

Mediolanum International Funds Ltd increased its holdings in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) by 130.1% in the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The firm owned 143,129 shares of the data storage provider’s stock after buying an additional 80,922 shares during the quarter. Mediolanum International Funds Ltd’s holdings in NetApp were worth $16,632,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other hedge funds also recently bought and sold shares of NTAP. Public Sector Pension Investment Board lifted its position in shares of NetApp by 57.4% during the 2nd quarter. Public Sector Pension Investment Board now owns 7,897 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $1,017,000 after buying an additional 2,879 shares in the last quarter. Algert Global LLC lifted its holdings in NetApp by 26.9% during the second quarter. Algert Global LLC now owns 4,108 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $529,000 after purchasing an additional 870 shares in the last quarter. Creative Planning grew its position in shares of NetApp by 32.3% in the second quarter. Creative Planning now owns 23,928 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $3,082,000 after purchasing an additional 5,843 shares during the period. NewEdge Advisors LLC increased its stake in shares of NetApp by 22.5% during the second quarter. NewEdge Advisors LLC now owns 11,981 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $1,543,000 after purchasing an additional 2,203 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Northwestern Mutual Wealth Management Co. lifted its stake in NetApp by 3.5% in the 2nd quarter. Northwestern Mutual Wealth Management Co. now owns 6,007 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $773,000 after buying an additional 205 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 92.17% of the company’s stock.

NetApp Stock Up 1.8 %

NTAP stock opened at $122.44 on Friday. The firm has a market cap of $24.89 billion, a PE ratio of 22.51, a PEG ratio of 2.85 and a beta of 1.23. NetApp, Inc. has a one year low of $83.80 and a one year high of $135.45. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.39, a quick ratio of 0.84 and a current ratio of 0.91. The firm’s 50 day moving average price is $121.31 and its 200-day moving average price is $122.37.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, November 21st. The data storage provider reported $1.87 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.78 by $0.09. The business had revenue of $1.66 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.65 billion. NetApp had a return on equity of 123.63% and a net margin of 17.78%. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 6.1% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company posted $1.23 EPS. On average, equities research analysts anticipate that NetApp, Inc. will post 5.89 EPS for the current year.

NetApp Dividend Announcement

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, January 22nd. Shareholders of record on Friday, January 3rd were given a dividend of $0.52 per share. This represents a $2.08 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.70%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, January 3rd. NetApp’s dividend payout ratio is presently 38.24%.

Insider Activity

In other NetApp news, CAO Lorenzo Daniel De sold 326 shares of NetApp stock in a transaction dated Monday, November 18th. The stock was sold at an average price of $117.44, for a total value of $38,285.44. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. Also, Director Thomas Michael Nevens sold 3,333 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Monday, November 18th. The stock was sold at an average price of $119.23, for a total transaction of $397,393.59. Following the sale, the director now directly owns 9,277 shares in the company, valued at $1,106,096.71. This represents a 26.43 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last three months, insiders have sold 51,610 shares of company stock valued at $6,123,351. Company insiders own 0.47% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several equities research analysts have commented on the company. Citigroup boosted their price objective on NetApp from $130.00 to $135.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Friday, November 22nd. StockNews.com upgraded NetApp from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upgraded NetApp from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and set a $160.00 price objective on the stock in a report on Monday, December 16th. Northland Securities lifted their target price on shares of NetApp from $108.00 to $120.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a research note on Friday, November 22nd. Finally, Bank of America increased their target price on shares of NetApp from $115.00 to $121.00 and gave the company an “underperform” rating in a research report on Friday, November 22nd. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have given a hold rating and seven have given a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $139.20.

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.