Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Group Inc. Trims Stock Holdings in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP)

Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Group Inc. cut its holdings in shares of NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) by 1.2% during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 517,356 shares of the data storage provider’s stock after selling 6,075 shares during the quarter. Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Group Inc. owned approximately 0.25% of NetApp worth $60,055,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other institutional investors also recently made changes to their positions in the business. Northwest Investment Counselors LLC bought a new stake in shares of NetApp in the third quarter worth $27,000. Migdal Insurance & Financial Holdings Ltd. acquired a new position in NetApp during the 4th quarter worth $26,000. True Wealth Design LLC increased 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 last quarter. Capital Performance Advisors LLP bought a new stake in shares of NetApp in the 3rd quarter worth about $44,000. Finally, Ashton Thomas Securities LLC acquired a new stake in shares of NetApp in the 3rd quarter valued at about $51,000. 92.17% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, CFO Michael J. Berry sold 12,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, February 4th. The stock was 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 in the company, valued at $14,880,359.82. This represents a 9.21 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Also, President Cesar Cernuda sold 22,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, December 30th. The shares were sold at an average price of $114.99, for a total value of $2,529,780.00. Following the transaction, the president now directly owns 27,099 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $3,116,114.01. This represents a 44.81 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 64,110 shares of company stock worth $7,632,601 over the last ninety days. Company insiders own 0.47% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of equities analysts recently commented on NTAP shares. Wedbush reissued a “neutral” rating and issued a $120.00 price objective on shares of NetApp in a report on Friday, November 22nd. Stifel Nicolaus boosted their price target on NetApp from $140.00 to $145.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, November 22nd. StockNews.com raised NetApp from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, January 28th. Citigroup lifted their price objective on shares of NetApp from $130.00 to $135.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday, November 22nd. Finally, Barclays increased their target price on shares of NetApp from $119.00 to $132.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Friday, November 22nd. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have assigned a hold rating and seven have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $139.20.

NetApp Trading Down 0.9 %

NASDAQ:NTAP opened at $122.91 on Monday. The stock has a market cap of $24.99 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 22.59, a PEG ratio of 2.94 and a beta of 1.23. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.39, a quick ratio of 0.84 and a current ratio of 0.91. NetApp, Inc. has a 1 year low of $83.80 and a 1 year high of $135.45. The business has a fifty day moving average of $120.99 and a 200-day moving average of $122.07.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last announced its earnings results 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. NetApp had a net margin of 17.78% and a return on equity of 123.63%. The firm had revenue of $1.66 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.65 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm posted $1.23 EPS. NetApp’s revenue was up 6.1% compared to the same quarter last year. Equities analysts predict that NetApp, Inc. will post 5.89 earnings per share for the current year.

NetApp Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, January 22nd. Investors of record on Friday, January 3rd were issued a dividend of $0.52 per share. The ex-dividend date was Friday, January 3rd. This represents a $2.08 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.69%. 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.