F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) Announces Earnings Results

F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) released its earnings results on Tuesday. The network technology company reported $4.45 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.63 by $0.82, FiscalAI reports. F5 had a net margin of 22.42% and a return on equity of 21.76%. The firm had revenue of $822.47 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $755.97 million.

F5 Stock Up 1.1%

F5 stock traded up $2.98 during trading hours on Tuesday, hitting $270.43. The stock had a trading volume of 2,016,288 shares, compared to its average volume of 1,021,206. The business’s 50 day simple moving average is $255.38 and its 200-day simple moving average is $287.03. F5 has a one year low of $223.76 and a one year high of $346.00. The stock has a market cap of $15.71 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 22.90, a P/E/G ratio of 8.13 and a beta of 0.98.

Insider Transactions at F5

In other news, CEO Francois Locoh-Donou sold 1,300 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Monday, December 1st. The shares were sold at an average price of $236.99, for a total transaction of $308,087.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer owned 150,323 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $35,625,047.77. This trade represents a 0.86% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, Director Alan Higginson sold 1,309 shares of F5 stock in a transaction on Wednesday, December 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $237.11, for a total transaction of $310,376.99. Following the transaction, the director owned 8,610 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,041,517.10. This trade represents a 13.20% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. Over the last three months, insiders have sold 33,815 shares of company stock worth $8,444,286. Insiders own 0.52% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On F5

A number of institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in FFIV. Geneos Wealth Management Inc. lifted its stake in F5 by 288.1% in the first quarter. Geneos Wealth Management Inc. now owns 163 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $43,000 after buying an additional 121 shares during the period. MUFG Securities EMEA plc bought a new stake in shares of F5 in the 2nd quarter valued at $50,000. Triumph Capital Management acquired a new position in shares of F5 during the 3rd quarter valued at $100,000. Advisory Services Network LLC bought a new position in F5 during the third quarter worth $116,000. Finally, Zacks Investment Management acquired a new stake in F5 in the third quarter worth $202,000. Institutional investors own 90.66% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of research analysts recently issued reports on FFIV shares. Morgan Stanley decreased their price objective on shares of F5 from $336.00 to $296.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, December 17th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised F5 from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and raised their target price for the company from $295.00 to $345.00 in a report on Thursday, January 15th. Bank of America decreased their price target on F5 from $260.00 to $250.00 and set an “underperform” rating on the stock in a research note on Tuesday, October 28th. Wall Street Zen downgraded F5 from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Friday, November 28th. Finally, Weiss Ratings reaffirmed a “buy (b-)” rating on shares of F5 in a research note on Monday, December 29th. Six research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, five have assigned a Hold rating and two have issued a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, F5 has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $299.78.

F5 Company Profile

F5 Inc (NASDAQ:FFIV) specializes in application services and delivery networking, helping organizations ensure the availability, performance and security of their applications. The company’s core offerings include advanced load balancing, traffic management and application security solutions designed to optimize user experiences and protect against threats such as distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks and web application exploits.

At the heart of F5’s product portfolio is the BIG-IP platform, which provides a suite of software modules for local and global traffic management, secure web application firewalling and DNS service delivery.