F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) Sets New 1-Year High – Here’s Why

F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV) shares reached a new 52-week high during mid-day trading on Tuesday . The company traded as high as $395.94 and last traded at $391.94, with a volume of 17844 shares. The stock had previously closed at $393.63.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several equities analysts have weighed in on FFIV shares. Royal Bank Of Canada lifted their price target on shares of F5 from $375.00 to $425.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Tuesday, May 19th. Barclays reaffirmed an “overweight” rating on shares of F5 in a report on Tuesday. Weiss Ratings raised shares of F5 from a “hold (c+)” rating to a “buy (b-)” rating in a report on Monday, March 30th. Piper Sandler reiterated an “overweight” rating on shares of F5 in a research report on Wednesday, April 29th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted their price objective on shares of F5 from $355.00 to $365.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, April 29th. Seven analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, four have issued a Hold rating and one has given a Sell rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, F5 currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $353.00.

F5 Price Performance

The firm’s 50-day moving average is $318.97 and its two-hundred day moving average is $282.16. The company has a market cap of $22.36 billion, a P/E ratio of 32.51, a PEG ratio of 9.05 and a beta of 1.00.

F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, April 28th. The network technology company reported $3.90 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.47 by $0.43. F5 had a net margin of 21.96% and a return on equity of 21.50%. The company had revenue of $811.70 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $783.82 million. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business posted $3.42 earnings per share. F5’s quarterly revenue was up 11.0% on a year-over-year basis. F5 has set its Q3 2026 guidance at 3.910-4.030 EPS and its FY 2026 guidance at 16.250-16.550 EPS. As a group, sell-side analysts expect that F5, Inc. will post 12.79 EPS for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, EVP Chad Michael Whalen sold 6,200 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Friday, May 8th. The shares were sold at an average price of $350.19, for a total value of $2,171,178.00. Following the sale, the executive vice president owned 20,832 shares in the company, valued at approximately $7,295,158.08. The trade was a 22.94% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, EVP Thomas Dean Fountain sold 1,328 shares of F5 stock in a transaction on Tuesday, May 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $330.58, for a total transaction of $439,010.24. Following the transaction, the executive vice president directly owned 8,060 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,664,474.80. The trade was a 14.15% decrease in their ownership of the stock. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Insiders have sold a total of 24,491 shares of company stock valued at $7,966,227 in the last three months. Corporate insiders own 0.48% of the company’s stock.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On F5

Large investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Hazlett Burt & Watson Inc. bought a new position in F5 in the fourth quarter worth about $26,000. Hantz Financial Services Inc. raised its holdings in F5 by 109.8% in the fourth quarter. Hantz Financial Services Inc. now owns 107 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $27,000 after purchasing an additional 56 shares in the last quarter. Elyxium Wealth LLC bought a new position in F5 in the fourth quarter worth about $28,000. SJS Investment Consulting Inc. raised its holdings in F5 by 963.6% in the first quarter. SJS Investment Consulting Inc. now owns 117 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $34,000 after purchasing an additional 106 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Capital Advisors Ltd. LLC raised its holdings in F5 by 113.8% in the first quarter. Capital Advisors Ltd. LLC now owns 124 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $36,000 after purchasing an additional 66 shares in the last quarter. 90.66% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

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.