Empirical Finance LLC Sells 99 Shares of NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP)

Empirical Finance LLC trimmed its holdings in shares of NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) by 1.3% in the fourth quarter, according to its most recent filing with the SEC. The firm owned 7,284 shares of the data storage provider’s stock after selling 99 shares during the period. Empirical Finance LLC’s holdings in NetApp were worth $846,000 as of its most recent filing with the SEC.

Several other institutional investors have also made changes to their positions in the business. Sanctuary Advisors LLC acquired a new stake in NetApp during the second quarter valued at approximately $566,000. CWM LLC lifted its position in shares of NetApp by 9.9% during the 3rd quarter. CWM LLC now owns 10,718 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $1,324,000 after buying an additional 965 shares during the period. Ritholtz Wealth Management boosted its stake in NetApp by 30.4% in the 3rd quarter. Ritholtz Wealth Management now owns 6,200 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $766,000 after buying an additional 1,444 shares in the last quarter. Exchange Traded Concepts LLC grew its position in NetApp by 4,225.0% in the third quarter. Exchange Traded Concepts LLC now owns 2,249 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $278,000 after acquiring an additional 2,197 shares during the period. Finally, MEAG MUNICH ERGO Kapitalanlagegesellschaft mbH raised its stake in NetApp by 204.4% during the third quarter. MEAG MUNICH ERGO Kapitalanlagegesellschaft mbH now owns 36,744 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $4,538,000 after acquiring an additional 24,675 shares in the last quarter. 92.17% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

NTAP has been the topic of several analyst reports. TD Cowen upped their target price on shares of NetApp from $145.00 to $160.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, November 22nd. Northland Securities upped their price objective 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. StockNews.com raised shares of NetApp from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, January 28th. Oppenheimer initiated coverage on NetApp in a research report on Wednesday, November 13th. They set a “market perform” rating on the stock. Finally, Susquehanna downgraded NetApp from a “positive” rating to a “neutral” rating and cut their price objective for the company from $155.00 to $130.00 in a research report on Monday. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have given a hold rating and six have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, NetApp presently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $137.53.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other NetApp news, CFO Michael J. Berry sold 12,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, February 4th. The shares were sold at an average price of $120.74, for a total value of $1,509,250.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief financial officer now owns 123,243 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $14,880,359.82. This represents a 9.21 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, President Cesar Cernuda sold 22,000 shares of NetApp stock in a transaction on Monday, December 30th. The stock was sold at an average price of $114.99, for a total transaction of $2,529,780.00. Following the transaction, the president now directly owns 27,099 shares in the company, valued at approximately $3,116,114.01. This represents a 44.81 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last quarter, insiders have sold 64,110 shares of company stock worth $7,632,601. Insiders own 0.47% of the company’s stock.

NetApp Stock Up 0.1 %

Shares of NASDAQ NTAP opened at $123.02 on Tuesday. NetApp, Inc. has a 1 year low of $83.80 and a 1 year high of $135.45. The firm’s 50-day moving average is $120.99 and its 200-day moving average is $122.04. 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 firm has a market capitalization of $25.01 billion, a PE ratio of 22.61, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.94 and a beta of 1.23.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last announced 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. The firm had revenue of $1.66 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.65 billion. NetApp had a net margin of 17.78% and a return on equity of 123.63%. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 6.1% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the firm earned $1.23 earnings per share. Equities analysts expect that NetApp, Inc. will post 5.89 EPS for the current year.

NetApp Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, January 22nd. Shareholders of record on Friday, January 3rd were paid a $0.52 dividend. This represents a $2.08 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.69%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, January 3rd. NetApp’s payout ratio is 38.24%.

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.