Connor Clark & Lunn Investment Management Ltd. Makes New $1.43 Million Investment in F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV)

Connor Clark & Lunn Investment Management Ltd. acquired a new position in F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV) in the third quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund acquired 6,483 shares of the network technology company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,428,000.

A number of other institutional investors also recently made changes to their positions in FFIV. Pacer Advisors Inc. boosted its holdings in F5 by 6,700.2% during the 2nd quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. now owns 848,388 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $146,118,000 after acquiring an additional 835,912 shares during the period. Wedge Capital Management L L P NC bought a new stake in F5 in the third quarter valued at approximately $61,386,000. Los Angeles Capital Management LLC boosted its stake in shares of F5 by 1,681.1% during the third quarter. Los Angeles Capital Management LLC now owns 285,639 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $62,898,000 after purchasing an additional 269,602 shares during the period. AQR Capital Management LLC grew its holdings in shares of F5 by 48.9% in the second quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 652,972 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $111,932,000 after purchasing an additional 214,351 shares during the last quarter. Finally, American Century Companies Inc. increased its stake in shares of F5 by 10.5% in the second quarter. American Century Companies Inc. now owns 1,709,296 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $294,392,000 after buying an additional 162,820 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 90.66% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of equities research analysts have issued reports on FFIV shares. StockNews.com raised shares of F5 from a “buy” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, October 29th. Evercore ISI boosted their price target on F5 from $180.00 to $210.00 and gave the company an “in-line” rating in a report on Tuesday, July 30th. The Goldman Sachs Group increased their price objective on F5 from $212.00 to $241.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Tuesday, October 29th. Morgan Stanley boosted their target price on F5 from $215.00 to $230.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Tuesday, October 29th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised their price target on F5 from $225.00 to $250.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Tuesday, October 29th. Seven analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, two have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $233.56.

F5 Trading Up 1.3 %

FFIV opened at $251.92 on Wednesday. The company has a market cap of $14.77 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 26.35, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.34 and a beta of 1.05. The stock has a fifty day simple moving average of $227.29 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $197.64. F5, Inc. has a 12-month low of $159.01 and a 12-month high of $252.16.

F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Monday, October 28th. The network technology company reported $3.67 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.45 by $0.22. F5 had a net margin of 20.13% and a return on equity of 20.80%. The company had revenue of $747.00 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $730.43 million. During the same period last year, the business earned $2.76 EPS. F5’s quarterly revenue was up 5.7% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, analysts predict that F5, Inc. will post 11.01 EPS for the current year.

F5 announced that its board has approved a share buyback plan on Monday, October 28th that permits the company to buyback $1.00 billion in outstanding shares. This buyback authorization permits the network technology company to reacquire up to 7.9% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback plans are typically an indication that the company’s leadership believes its stock is undervalued.

Insider Activity

In related news, Director Alan Higginson sold 825 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, November 19th. The stock was sold at an average price of $239.77, for a total transaction of $197,810.25. Following the completion of the transaction, the director now owns 9,882 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,369,407.14. This trade represents a 7.71 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, CFO Francis J. Pelzer sold 600 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Friday, September 20th. The stock was sold at an average price of $217.50, for a total value of $130,500.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief financial officer now directly owns 30,425 shares in the company, valued at $6,617,437.50. This trade represents a 1.93 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last ninety days, insiders sold 4,475 shares of company stock worth $977,039. Insiders own 0.58% 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.