Kera Capital Partners Inc. Takes Position in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP)

Kera Capital Partners Inc. acquired a new stake in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor acquired 1,832 shares of the data storage provider’s stock, valued at approximately $213,000.

Several other large investors have also bought and sold shares of the company. Sei Investments Co. boosted its holdings in NetApp by 7.8% during the second quarter. Sei Investments Co. now owns 370,032 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $47,660,000 after buying an additional 26,814 shares in the last quarter. Summit Trail Advisors LLC boosted its stake in shares of NetApp by 12.6% during the 2nd quarter. Summit Trail Advisors LLC now owns 3,332 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $429,000 after acquiring an additional 372 shares in the last quarter. Ensign Peak Advisors Inc grew its holdings in shares of NetApp by 29.1% in the 2nd quarter. Ensign Peak Advisors Inc now owns 248,675 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $32,029,000 after acquiring an additional 56,070 shares during the last quarter. Profund Advisors LLC raised its position in shares of NetApp by 6.8% during the second quarter. Profund Advisors LLC now owns 4,247 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $547,000 after purchasing an additional 271 shares during the period. Finally, ProShare Advisors LLC lifted its holdings in shares of NetApp by 6.5% during the second quarter. ProShare Advisors LLC now owns 38,431 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $4,950,000 after purchasing an additional 2,349 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 92.17% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several research firms have issued reports on NTAP. Morgan Stanley boosted their price objective on NetApp from $132.00 to $146.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Tuesday, December 17th. TD Cowen upped their price target on shares of NetApp from $145.00 to $160.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, November 22nd. Stifel Nicolaus lifted their price objective on shares of NetApp from $140.00 to $145.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, November 22nd. Barclays increased their target price on NetApp from $119.00 to $132.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a report on Friday, November 22nd. Finally, Bank of America lifted their price target on NetApp from $115.00 to $121.00 and gave the company an “underperform” rating in a report on Friday, November 22nd. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have assigned a hold rating and seven have given a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $139.20.

NetApp Trading Up 1.8 %

Shares of NASDAQ:NTAP opened at $122.09 on Monday. NetApp, Inc. has a 1 year low of $83.80 and a 1 year high of $135.45. The firm has a fifty day moving average price of $120.88 and a 200 day moving average price of $122.76. The company has a current ratio of 0.91, a quick ratio of 0.84 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.39. The stock has a market capitalization of $24.82 billion, a PE ratio of 22.44, a P/E/G ratio of 2.76 and a beta of 1.23.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, November 21st. The data storage provider reported $1.87 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.78 by $0.09. NetApp had a return on equity of 123.63% and a net margin of 17.78%. The business had revenue of $1.66 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.65 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm posted $1.23 EPS. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 6.1% on a year-over-year basis. Analysts expect that NetApp, Inc. will post 5.88 EPS for the current fiscal year.

NetApp Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, January 22nd. Investors of record on Friday, January 3rd will be issued a dividend of $0.52 per share. This represents a $2.08 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.70%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, January 3rd. NetApp’s dividend payout ratio is currently 38.24%.

Insider Activity at NetApp

In other news, EVP Elizabeth M. O’callahan sold 451 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Friday, January 10th. The shares were sold at an average price of $116.79, for a total value of $52,672.29. Following the sale, the executive vice president now owns 12,005 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,402,063.95. This trade represents a 3.62 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, CEO George Kurian sold 8,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on 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 transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 279,782 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $34,774,104.78. The trade was a 2.95 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last three months, insiders have sold 43,110 shares of company stock worth $5,077,596. 0.47% of the stock is owned by insiders.

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.