National Pension Service Sells 8,926 Shares of NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP)

National Pension Service decreased its stake in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) by 2.0% during the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The institutional investor owned 427,239 shares of the data storage provider’s stock after selling 8,926 shares during the quarter. National Pension Service’s holdings in NetApp were worth $49,594,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Migdal Insurance & Financial Holdings Ltd. bought a new position in shares of NetApp in the 4th quarter worth $26,000. Golden State Wealth Management LLC bought a new position in shares of NetApp in the 4th quarter worth $35,000. True Wealth Design LLC increased its holdings 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 buying an additional 340 shares during the last quarter. Capital Performance Advisors LLP bought a new position in shares of NetApp in the 3rd quarter worth $44,000. Finally, Ashton Thomas Securities LLC bought a new position in shares of NetApp in the 3rd quarter worth $51,000. Institutional investors own 92.17% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

NTAP has been the topic of a number of research analyst reports. TD Cowen increased their price target on shares of NetApp from $145.00 to $160.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, November 22nd. Citigroup increased their target price on shares of NetApp from $130.00 to $135.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday, November 22nd. Stifel Nicolaus increased their target price on shares of NetApp from $140.00 to $145.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, November 22nd. Susquehanna lowered shares of NetApp from a “positive” rating to a “neutral” rating and reduced their target price for the company from $155.00 to $130.00 in a report on Monday, February 10th. Finally, Bank of America raised shares of NetApp from an “underperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and increased their target price for the company from $121.00 to $128.00 in a report on Wednesday, February 19th. Eleven investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and seven have assigned a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, NetApp currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $137.33.

Insider Activity at NetApp

In related news, CFO Michael J. Berry sold 12,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, February 4th. The shares were sold at an average price of $120.74, for a total transaction of $1,509,250.00. Following the sale, the chief financial officer now owns 123,243 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $14,880,359.82. This represents a 9.21 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. Also, CEO George Kurian sold 8,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, February 18th. The shares were sold at an average price of $119.04, for a total transaction of $1,011,840.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 266,765 shares in the company, 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 have sold a total of 60,903 shares of company stock valued at $7,260,341 over the last 90 days. 0.47% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

NetApp Price Performance

Shares of NASDAQ:NTAP opened at $118.22 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.39, a quick ratio of 0.84 and a current ratio of 0.91. The firm has a fifty day moving average price of $120.22 and a 200 day moving average price of $122.02. NetApp, Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $86.43 and a fifty-two week high of $135.45. The firm has a market cap of $24.03 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 21.73, a P/E/G ratio of 2.45 and a beta of 1.23.

NetApp Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, April 23rd. Investors of record on Friday, April 4th will be paid a dividend of $0.52 per share. This represents a $2.08 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.76%. NetApp’s payout ratio is 38.24%.

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.