Wealth Alliance Sells 515 Shares of NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP)

Wealth Alliance lessened its stake in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) by 18.2% during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 2,316 shares of the data storage provider’s stock after selling 515 shares during the quarter. Wealth Alliance’s holdings in NetApp were worth $269,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other large investors also recently modified their holdings of NTAP. KBC Group NV lifted its holdings in shares of NetApp by 276.9% in the fourth quarter. KBC Group NV now owns 891,033 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $103,431,000 after purchasing an additional 654,626 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC lifted its holdings in shares of NetApp by 8.2% in the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 5,985,673 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $738,280,000 after purchasing an additional 453,324 shares in the last quarter. Robeco Institutional Asset Management B.V. lifted its holdings in shares of 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 in the last quarter. Unigestion Holding SA lifted its holdings in NetApp by 926.1% during the third quarter. Unigestion Holding SA now owns 283,674 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $35,022,000 after acquiring an additional 256,028 shares during the period. Finally, Retirement Systems of Alabama lifted its holdings in NetApp by 546.8% during the fourth quarter. Retirement Systems of Alabama now owns 289,504 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $33,606,000 after acquiring an additional 244,746 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 92.17% of the company’s stock.

Insider Activity

In other news, CEO George Kurian sold 8,500 shares of NetApp stock in a transaction on Monday, December 16th. The stock was sold at an average price of $124.29, for a total value of $1,056,465.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 279,782 shares in the company, valued at approximately $34,774,104.78. The trade was a 2.95 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, EVP Elizabeth M. O’callahan sold 451 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, January 10th. The stock was sold at an average price of $116.79, for a total value of $52,672.29. Following the transaction, the executive vice president now owns 12,005 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,402,063.95. The trade was a 3.62 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last three months, insiders sold 60,903 shares of company stock worth $7,260,341. 0.47% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

NetApp Price Performance

Shares of NASDAQ NTAP opened at $124.47 on Friday. The stock has a market cap of $25.31 billion, a PE ratio of 22.88, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.96 and a beta of 1.23. NetApp, Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $85.28 and a fifty-two week 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 stock has a fifty day moving average of $120.07 and a 200-day moving average of $121.86.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, November 21st. The data storage provider reported $1.87 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.78 by $0.09. The company had revenue of $1.66 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.65 billion. NetApp had a return on equity of 123.63% and a net margin of 17.78%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 6.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the business earned $1.23 earnings per share. Equities research analysts anticipate that NetApp, Inc. will post 5.89 earnings per share for the current year.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of analysts recently commented on NTAP shares. StockNews.com upgraded NetApp from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday. Morgan Stanley lifted their price target on NetApp from $132.00 to $146.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Tuesday, December 17th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upgraded 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. Citigroup lifted their price target on NetApp from $130.00 to $135.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday, November 22nd. Finally, Barclays lifted their price target on NetApp from $119.00 to $132.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Friday, November 22nd. Eleven investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and six have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $137.33.

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.