Ibex Wealth Advisors Makes New Investment in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP)

Ibex Wealth Advisors purchased a new stake in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund purchased 3,301 shares of the data storage provider’s stock, valued at approximately $383,000.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Northwest Investment Counselors LLC bought a new stake in NetApp in the third quarter valued at approximately $27,000. True Wealth Design LLC lifted its position in shares of NetApp by 2,833.3% in the 3rd quarter. True Wealth Design LLC now owns 352 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $43,000 after purchasing an additional 340 shares during the period. Capital Performance Advisors LLP bought a new stake in shares of NetApp in the 3rd quarter valued at $44,000. Ashton Thomas Securities LLC acquired a new stake in shares of NetApp during the third quarter worth $51,000. Finally, Geneos Wealth Management Inc. raised its stake in NetApp by 22.3% during the fourth quarter. Geneos Wealth Management Inc. now owns 549 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $64,000 after buying an additional 100 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 92.17% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of analysts have commented on NTAP shares. Oppenheimer began coverage on shares of NetApp in a research report on Wednesday, November 13th. They set a “market perform” rating on the stock. Wedbush restated a “neutral” rating and set a $120.00 target price on shares of NetApp in a research report on Friday, November 22nd. Northland Securities raised their target price on NetApp from $108.00 to $120.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a research note on Friday, November 22nd. Bank of America boosted their price target on NetApp from $115.00 to $121.00 and gave the company an “underperform” rating in a research note on Friday, November 22nd. Finally, StockNews.com raised shares of NetApp from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have given a hold rating and seven have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $139.20.

Insider Activity at NetApp

In other news, CEO George Kurian sold 8,500 shares of the stock in a transaction on Tuesday, January 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $123.03, for a total transaction of $1,045,755.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 271,282 shares in the company, valued at approximately $33,375,824.46. This represents a 3.04 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, CAO Lorenzo Daniel De sold 326 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, November 18th. The shares were sold at an average price of $117.44, for a total value of $38,285.44. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last 90 days, insiders sold 51,610 shares of company stock worth $6,123,351. 0.47% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

NetApp Trading Up 0.6 %

NTAP opened at $120.28 on Thursday. The firm has a market capitalization of $24.45 billion, a PE ratio of 22.11, a P/E/G ratio of 2.99 and a beta of 1.23. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.39, a current ratio of 0.91 and a quick ratio of 0.84. NetApp, Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $83.80 and a fifty-two week high of $135.45. The company’s 50-day moving average is $121.37 and its 200 day moving average is $122.38.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last issued its quarterly earnings data 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 business had revenue of $1.66 billion for 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 business’s revenue was up 6.1% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the business earned $1.23 EPS. As a group, research analysts predict that NetApp, Inc. will post 5.89 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

NetApp Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, January 22nd. Stockholders of record on Friday, January 3rd were paid a dividend of $0.52 per share. This represents a $2.08 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.73%. The ex-dividend date 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.