Rakuten Investment Management Inc. Purchases New Position in NetApp, Inc. $NTAP

Rakuten Investment Management Inc. acquired a new stake in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) in the 2nd quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The fund acquired 32,275 shares of the data storage provider’s stock, valued at approximately $5,005,000.

A number of other hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Park Square Financial Group LLC increased its holdings in shares of NetApp by 68.7% during the fourth quarter. Park Square Financial Group LLC now owns 253 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $29,000 after buying an additional 103 shares in the last quarter. Gen Wealth Partners Inc acquired a new stake in shares of NetApp during the 4th quarter valued at $30,000. DV Equities LLC acquired a new stake in shares of NetApp during the 4th quarter valued at $30,000. Roble Belko & Company Inc bought a new stake in NetApp during the 1st quarter worth $31,000. Finally, Torren Management LLC bought a new stake in NetApp during the 4th quarter worth $34,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 92.17% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of equities analysts have issued reports on NTAP shares. Evercore set a $210.00 target price on NetApp in a report on Monday, August 24th. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their price target on NetApp from $115.00 to $180.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Friday, May 29th. Weiss Ratings upgraded NetApp from a “hold (c+)” rating to a “buy (b-)” rating in a report on Monday, June 8th. UBS Group reaffirmed a “neutral” rating and issued a $160.00 price objective on shares of NetApp in a research note on Friday, May 29th. Finally, Argus raised their price objective on shares of NetApp from $130.00 to $200.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Monday, June 1st. Five analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and ten have issued a Hold rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $179.77.

Insider Activity at NetApp

In other NetApp news, EVP Elizabeth M. O’callahan sold 1,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, August 10th. The stock was sold at an average price of $193.82, for a total value of $193,820.00. Following the transaction, the executive vice president directly owned 30,297 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $5,872,164.54. The trade was a 3.20% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, President Cesar Cernuda sold 2,608 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, August 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $204.48, for a total transaction of $533,283.84. Following the sale, the president directly owned 46,530 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $9,514,454.40. This trade represents a 5.31% decrease in their position. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. Insiders have sold a total of 55,297 shares of company stock worth $8,758,016 in the last 90 days. Corporate insiders own 0.36% of the company’s stock.

NetApp Price Performance

NTAP stock opened at $187.02 on Friday. The company has a quick ratio of 1.39, a current ratio of 1.44 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.84. The firm has a market cap of $36.70 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 29.41, a PEG ratio of 3.33 and a beta of 1.45. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $175.90 and its 200 day simple moving average is $138.03. NetApp, Inc. has a 12-month low of $93.69 and a 12-month high of $209.06.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, May 28th. The data storage provider reported $2.03 earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.27 by ($0.24). NetApp had a return on equity of 117.23% and a net margin of 18.43%.The business had revenue of $1.95 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.87 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business posted $1.93 earnings per share. The business’s revenue was up 12.5% on a year-over-year basis. On average, analysts expect that NetApp, Inc. will post 7.34 earnings per share for the current year.

About NetApp

NetApp, Inc (NASDAQ: NTAP) is a data management and storage company that delivers hybrid cloud data services for applications and data. Founded in 1992 as Network Appliance and rebranded as NetApp in 2008, the company is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California. NetApp’s offering focuses on enabling organizations to store, manage, protect and move data across on-premises environments and major public clouds.

The company’s product portfolio centers on the ONTAP data management software and a range of storage systems and services built around it.