F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) Releases Earnings Results, Beats Expectations By $0.73 EPS

F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) issued its earnings results on Monday. The network technology company reported $4.73 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $4.00 by $0.73, FiscalAI reports. The business had revenue of $865.08 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $834.60 million. F5 had a return on equity of 21.50% and a net margin of 21.96%.

F5 Price Performance

FFIV stock traded up $15.75 during midday trading on Monday, reaching $407.96. The company had a trading volume of 1,527,805 shares, compared to its average volume of 762,641. F5 has a 1-year low of $223.76 and a 1-year high of $435.00. The stock has a 50 day moving average price of $400.23 and a 200-day moving average price of $329.84. The company has a market capitalization of $23.02 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 33.47, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 4.60 and a beta of 1.03.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

FFIV has been the subject of a number of recent research reports. Morgan Stanley boosted their target price on F5 from $340.00 to $380.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, May 20th. Royal Bank Of Canada reiterated an “outperform” rating on shares of F5 in a report on Thursday, July 16th. Bank of America lifted their price objective on F5 from $250.00 to $300.00 and gave the stock an “underperform” rating in a research report on Tuesday, May 26th. Zacks Research raised F5 from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Friday, June 26th. Finally, Barclays upped their target price on shares of F5 from $292.00 to $386.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Friday, May 29th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, five have assigned a Buy rating, four have assigned a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $382.67.

Insider Transactions at F5

In related news, EVP Thomas Dean Fountain sold 1,328 shares of F5 stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, May 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $330.58, for a total value 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. This trade represents a 14.15% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, CEO Francois Locoh-Donou sold 3,783 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, May 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $337.39, for a total transaction of $1,276,346.37. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer owned 146,989 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $49,592,618.71. This represents a 2.51% 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. Over the last quarter, insiders sold 22,579 shares of company stock worth $7,836,860. Corporate insiders own 0.48% of the company’s stock.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On F5

Institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the business. UMB Bank n.a. boosted its stake in F5 by 64.5% in the fourth quarter. UMB Bank n.a. now owns 153 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $39,000 after buying an additional 60 shares in the last quarter. Geneos Wealth Management Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of F5 by 288.1% in the first quarter. Geneos Wealth Management Inc. now owns 163 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $43,000 after acquiring an additional 121 shares during the last quarter. MUFG Securities EMEA plc bought a new position in shares of F5 in the second quarter worth about $50,000. Triumph Capital Management acquired a new stake in shares of F5 in the 3rd quarter valued at approximately $100,000. Finally, Advisory Services Network LLC acquired a new stake in shares of F5 in the 3rd quarter valued at approximately $116,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 90.66% of the company’s stock.

About F5

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.