Bridgewater Associates LP Acquires 5,201 Shares of F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV)

Bridgewater Associates LP boosted its holdings in F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV) by 8.1% during the third quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The fund owned 69,548 shares of the network technology company’s stock after purchasing an additional 5,201 shares during the period. Bridgewater Associates LP’s holdings in F5 were worth $15,314,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Other hedge funds have also added to or reduced their stakes in the company. O Shaughnessy Asset Management LLC acquired a new stake in shares of F5 during the 1st quarter worth about $274,000. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD lifted its position in F5 by 1.0% during the first quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 80,292 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $15,224,000 after acquiring an additional 811 shares during the last quarter. Kennedy Capital Management LLC boosted its holdings in shares of F5 by 25.3% during the first quarter. Kennedy Capital Management LLC now owns 8,845 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $1,677,000 after acquiring an additional 1,787 shares during the period. Janus Henderson Group PLC grew its position in shares of F5 by 195.1% in the first quarter. Janus Henderson Group PLC now owns 21,994 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $4,170,000 after purchasing an additional 14,541 shares during the last quarter. Finally, California State Teachers Retirement System increased its stake in shares of F5 by 2.0% during the first quarter. California State Teachers Retirement System now owns 98,769 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $18,726,000 after purchasing an additional 1,908 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 90.66% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several analysts recently issued reports on the company. The Goldman Sachs Group boosted their price target on F5 from $212.00 to $241.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Tuesday, October 29th. Piper Sandler boosted their target price on shares of F5 from $186.00 to $246.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Tuesday, October 29th. Barclays upped their price target on shares of F5 from $214.00 to $246.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Tuesday, October 29th. Royal Bank of Canada lifted their price objective on shares of F5 from $205.00 to $240.00 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a research note on Tuesday, October 29th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased their price target on F5 from $225.00 to $250.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Tuesday, October 29th. Seven equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, two have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $233.56.

Insider Activity

In related news, CEO Francois Locoh-Donou sold 1,450 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, October 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $218.26, for a total transaction of $316,477.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 121,122 shares in the company, valued at $26,436,087.72. The trade was a 1.18 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, Director Alan Higginson sold 1,000 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Monday, September 9th. The shares were sold at an average price of $201.65, for a total value of $201,650.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director now owns 10,707 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,159,066.55. This represents a 8.54 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last three months, insiders have sold 4,475 shares of company stock worth $977,039. Corporate insiders own 0.58% of the company’s stock.

F5 Stock Performance

Shares of FFIV stock opened at $250.07 on Thursday. F5, Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $159.01 and a fifty-two week high of $252.30. The stock’s fifty day moving average price is $228.03 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $198.20. The company has a market cap of $14.66 billion, a PE ratio of 26.16, a P/E/G ratio of 3.36 and a beta of 1.05.

F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) last released its quarterly earnings data on Monday, October 28th. The network technology company reported $3.67 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.45 by $0.22. F5 had a return on equity of 20.80% and a net margin of 20.13%. The business had revenue of $747.00 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $730.43 million. During the same period last year, the firm posted $2.76 earnings per share. F5’s revenue was up 5.7% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, equities analysts predict that F5, Inc. will post 11.01 EPS for the current fiscal year.

F5 declared that its Board of Directors has initiated a stock buyback plan on Monday, October 28th that allows the company to repurchase $1.00 billion in shares. This repurchase authorization allows the network technology company to purchase up to 7.9% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock repurchase plans are often an indication that the company’s board believes its stock is undervalued.

F5 Company Profile

F5, Inc provides multi-cloud application security and delivery solutions in the United States, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and the Asia Pacific region. The company’s distributed cloud services enable its customers to deploy, secure, and operate applications in any architecture, from on-premises to the public cloud.