Suncoast Equity Management Makes New $648,000 Investment in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP)

Suncoast Equity Management purchased a new stake in shares of NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The firm purchased 5,580 shares of the data storage provider’s stock, valued at approximately $648,000.

Other large investors have also recently made changes to their positions in the company. State Street Corp boosted its holdings in NetApp by 2.0% in the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 10,261,170 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $1,267,357,000 after purchasing an additional 199,384 shares during the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC lifted its holdings in shares of NetApp by 8.2% during the 3rd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 5,985,673 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $738,280,000 after buying an additional 453,324 shares during the period. Robeco Institutional Asset Management B.V. boosted its stake in shares of NetApp by 9.2% in the 4th quarter. Robeco Institutional Asset Management B.V. now owns 1,346,212 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $156,268,000 after buying an additional 113,360 shares during the last quarter. KBC Group NV grew 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 worth $103,431,000 after acquiring an additional 654,626 shares during the period. Finally, Barclays PLC grew its holdings in shares of NetApp by 31.4% in the third quarter. Barclays PLC now owns 784,339 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $96,873,000 after acquiring an additional 187,638 shares during the period. 92.17% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several brokerages have issued reports on NTAP. Stifel Nicolaus raised their target price on NetApp from $140.00 to $145.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, November 22nd. Wedbush reiterated a “neutral” rating and issued a $120.00 price objective on shares of NetApp in a research note on Friday, November 22nd. Susquehanna lowered shares of NetApp from a “positive” rating to a “neutral” rating and cut their target price for the company from $155.00 to $130.00 in a research report on Monday, February 10th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upgraded shares of NetApp from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and set a $160.00 price target on the stock in a research report on Monday, December 16th. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company dropped their price target on shares of NetApp from $140.00 to $130.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday. Eleven equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and six have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $137.33.

Insider Buying and Selling at NetApp

In other NetApp news, EVP Elizabeth M. O’callahan sold 451 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Friday, January 10th. The shares were sold at an average price of $116.79, for a total transaction of $52,672.29. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president now owns 12,005 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,402,063.95. This represents a 3.62 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Also, CEO George Kurian sold 8,500 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, February 18th. The shares were sold at an average price of $119.04, for a total value of $1,011,840.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 266,765 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $31,755,705.60. The trade was a 3.09 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 60,903 shares of company stock valued at $7,260,341 in the last three months. 0.47% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

NetApp Price Performance

NASDAQ:NTAP opened at $124.55 on Friday. The business’s 50-day simple moving average is $120.05 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $121.84. NetApp, Inc. has a 52 week low of $83.80 and a 52 week high of $135.45. The stock has a market cap of $25.32 billion, a PE ratio of 22.90, a P/E/G ratio of 2.96 and a beta of 1.23. The company has a quick ratio of 0.84, a current ratio of 0.91 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.39.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, November 21st. The data storage provider reported $1.87 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.78 by $0.09. NetApp had a return on equity of 123.63% and a net margin of 17.78%. The company had revenue of $1.66 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.65 billion. During the same quarter last year, the company earned $1.23 EPS. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 6.1% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, analysts forecast that NetApp, Inc. will post 5.89 EPS for the current fiscal year.

About NetApp

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.