Principal Financial Group Inc. Purchases 11,842 Shares of NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP)

Principal Financial Group Inc. increased its position in shares of NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) by 4.2% during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 294,309 shares of the data storage provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 11,842 shares during the period. Principal Financial Group Inc.’s holdings in NetApp were worth $34,163,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also bought and sold shares of the company. Intech Investment Management LLC increased its holdings in NetApp by 8.9% during the 3rd quarter. Intech Investment Management LLC now owns 302,010 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $37,301,000 after acquiring an additional 24,651 shares during the period. Daiwa Securities Group Inc. increased its holdings in shares of NetApp by 20.9% in the 3rd quarter. Daiwa Securities Group Inc. now owns 42,302 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $5,225,000 after buying an additional 7,318 shares during the last quarter. Robeco Institutional Asset Management B.V. increased its holdings in shares of NetApp by 9.2% in the 4th quarter. Robeco Institutional Asset Management B.V. now owns 1,346,212 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $156,268,000 after buying an additional 113,360 shares during the last quarter. Hilton Capital Management LLC bought a new position in shares of NetApp in the 3rd quarter worth $4,059,000. Finally, Orion Portfolio Solutions LLC increased its holdings in shares of NetApp by 232.2% in the 3rd quarter. Orion Portfolio Solutions LLC now owns 6,731 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $831,000 after buying an additional 4,705 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 92.17% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities analysts have recently commented on the stock. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised shares of NetApp from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and set a $160.00 price target on the stock in a report on Monday, December 16th. Morgan Stanley increased their price target on shares of NetApp from $132.00 to $146.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Tuesday, December 17th. Susquehanna lowered shares of NetApp from a “positive” rating to a “neutral” rating and decreased their price target for the stock from $155.00 to $130.00 in a report on Monday, February 10th. Wedbush reissued a “neutral” rating and issued a $120.00 price target on shares of NetApp in a report on Friday, November 22nd. Finally, Stifel Nicolaus increased their price target on shares of NetApp from $140.00 to $145.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, November 22nd. Eleven investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and six have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $137.33.

NetApp Price Performance

NTAP stock opened at $124.47 on Friday. The firm’s 50-day moving average price is $120.07 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $121.86. NetApp, Inc. has a 12-month low of $85.28 and a 12-month high of $135.45. The stock has a market capitalization of $25.31 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 22.88, a PEG ratio of 2.96 and a beta of 1.23. The company has a current ratio of 0.91, a quick ratio of 0.84 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.39.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last released its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, November 21st. The data storage provider reported $1.87 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating 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 firm had revenue of $1.66 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.65 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company earned $1.23 earnings per share. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 6.1% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities analysts predict that NetApp, Inc. will post 5.89 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Activity

In other news, President Cesar Cernuda sold 22,000 shares of NetApp stock in a transaction dated Monday, December 30th. The shares were sold at an average price of $114.99, for a total transaction of $2,529,780.00. Following the sale, the president now owns 27,099 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,116,114.01. The trade was a 44.81 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, CEO George Kurian sold 8,500 shares of NetApp stock in a transaction dated Monday, December 16th. The shares were sold at an average price of $124.29, for a total transaction of $1,056,465.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 279,782 shares in the company, valued at $34,774,104.78. The trade was a 2.95 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last 90 days, insiders have sold 60,903 shares of company stock valued at $7,260,341. Corporate insiders own 0.47% of the company’s stock.

NetApp 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.