Vontobel Holding Ltd. Reduces Stock Position in F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV)

Vontobel Holding Ltd. cut its stake in F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV) by 0.5% in the fourth quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 17,659 shares of the network technology company’s stock after selling 95 shares during the period. Vontobel Holding Ltd.’s holdings in F5 were worth $4,441,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

A number of other large investors have also made changes to their positions in the stock. Tokio Marine Asset Management Co. Ltd. grew its position in shares of F5 by 2.8% in the fourth quarter. Tokio Marine Asset Management Co. Ltd. now owns 1,607 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $404,000 after purchasing an additional 44 shares in the last quarter. Empirical Finance LLC grew its position in shares of F5 by 2.3% in the third quarter. Empirical Finance LLC now owns 2,049 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $451,000 after purchasing an additional 46 shares in the last quarter. Captrust Financial Advisors grew its position in shares of F5 by 2.0% in the third quarter. Captrust Financial Advisors now owns 2,598 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $572,000 after purchasing an additional 50 shares in the last quarter. First Trust Direct Indexing L.P. grew its position in shares of F5 by 2.9% in the third quarter. First Trust Direct Indexing L.P. now owns 2,030 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $447,000 after purchasing an additional 58 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Greenleaf Trust grew its position in shares of F5 by 5.7% in the fourth quarter. Greenleaf Trust now owns 1,091 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $274,000 after purchasing an additional 59 shares in the last quarter. 90.66% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of equities research analysts have recently issued reports on FFIV shares. Piper Sandler upped their price target on F5 from $246.00 to $304.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday, January 29th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased their price objective on F5 from $225.00 to $250.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Tuesday, October 29th. Needham & Company LLC increased their price objective on F5 from $285.00 to $360.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, January 29th. Royal Bank of Canada increased their price objective on F5 from $260.00 to $310.00 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, January 29th. Finally, Morgan Stanley increased their price objective on F5 from $262.00 to $310.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, January 29th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, seven have given a hold rating, one has assigned a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $295.00.

F5 Stock Down 0.1 %

NASDAQ:FFIV opened at $310.18 on Friday. The stock’s fifty day moving average is $271.00 and its two-hundred day moving average is $237.15. F5, Inc. has a 52 week low of $159.01 and a 52 week high of $312.76. The stock has a market capitalization of $17.88 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 30.83, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.90 and a beta of 1.06.

F5 announced that its Board of Directors has initiated a stock repurchase plan on Monday, October 28th that authorizes the company to repurchase $1.00 billion in outstanding shares. This repurchase authorization authorizes the network technology company to repurchase up to 7.9% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock repurchase plans are usually an indication that the company’s management believes its shares are undervalued.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other F5 news, CEO Francois Locoh-Donou sold 6,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, February 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $303.06, for a total transaction of $1,969,890.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 151,247 shares in the company, valued at $45,836,915.82. This represents a 4.12 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Also, Director Marianne Budnik sold 728 shares of the stock in a transaction on Thursday, January 30th. The shares were sold at an average price of $304.45, for a total value of $221,639.60. Following the completion of the sale, the director now owns 1,770 shares in the company, valued at approximately $538,876.50. The trade was a 29.14 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 12,399 shares of company stock worth $3,652,867 over the last ninety days. Corporate insiders own 0.52% of the company’s stock.

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.