Sequoia Financial Advisors LLC Sells 3,174 Shares of NetApp, Inc. $NTAP

Sequoia Financial Advisors LLC decreased its position in shares of NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) by 22.5% in the second quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 10,915 shares of the data storage provider’s stock after selling 3,174 shares during the period. Sequoia Financial Advisors LLC’s holdings in NetApp were worth $1,689,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also bought and sold shares of the company. California State Teachers Retirement System raised its stake in NetApp by 15,681.5% in the second quarter. California State Teachers Retirement System now owns 48,620,175 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $7,524,458,000 after buying an additional 48,312,092 shares during the last quarter. BlackRock Inc. acquired a new position in shares of NetApp during the second quarter valued at about $2,925,168,000. Primecap Management Co. CA purchased a new position in shares of NetApp in the 2nd quarter valued at approximately $1,395,423,000. Norges Bank acquired a new stake in NetApp in the 4th quarter worth approximately $458,060,000. Finally, First Trust Advisors LP boosted its stake in NetApp by 127.0% in the 1st quarter. First Trust Advisors LP now owns 3,658,066 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $374,549,000 after purchasing an additional 2,046,912 shares in the last quarter. 92.17% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of research analysts have issued reports on NTAP shares. Wells Fargo & Company upped their price target on shares of NetApp from $180.00 to $190.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Thursday, September 3rd. Susquehanna lifted their price objective on shares of NetApp from $185.00 to $195.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday, September 3rd. Citigroup dropped their price objective on shares of NetApp from $209.00 to $190.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, September 3rd. Weiss Ratings reissued a “buy (b-)” rating on shares of NetApp in a research report on Friday, September 4th. Finally, Morgan Stanley raised their target price on NetApp from $173.00 to $191.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Thursday, September 3rd. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, six have given a Buy rating and ten have given a Hold rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, NetApp currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $193.86.

Insider Activity at NetApp

In other news, Director Thomas Nevens sold 5,940 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, September 11th. The shares were sold at an average price of $195.21, for a total transaction of $1,159,547.40. Following the sale, the director owned 7,747 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,512,291.87. This trade represents a 43.40% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. Also, EVP Elizabeth M. O’callahan sold 1,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, September 10th. The shares were sold at an average price of $184.74, for a total transaction of $184,740.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president owned 30,737 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $5,678,353.38. This represents a 3.15% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. Over the last ninety days, insiders sold 61,012 shares of company stock worth $9,900,328. 0.36% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

NetApp Stock Down 5.5%

NTAP stock opened at $188.27 on Tuesday. The company has a market capitalization of $36.98 billion, a P/E ratio of 26.55, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.14 and a beta of 1.44. NetApp, Inc. has a 12 month low of $93.69 and a 12 month high of $209.06. The firm’s fifty day simple moving average is $182.58 and its 200-day simple moving average is $144.82. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.30, a current ratio of 1.24 and a quick ratio of 1.16.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, September 2nd. The data storage provider reported $2.58 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.12 by $0.46. The company had revenue of $2.02 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.84 billion. NetApp had a net margin of 19.18% and a return on equity of 119.13%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 29.9% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $1.15 earnings per share. NetApp has set its FY 2027 guidance at 9.730-10.030 EPS and its Q2 2027 guidance at 2.540-2.640 EPS. As a group, equities research analysts forecast that NetApp, Inc. will post 8.32 earnings per share for the current year.

NetApp Dividend Announcement

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, October 28th. Investors of record on Friday, October 9th will be issued a dividend of $0.52 per share. This represents a $2.08 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.1%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, October 9th. NetApp’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 29.34%.

About NetApp

NetApp, Inc (NASDAQ: NTAP) is a data infrastructure and cloud storage company that helps organizations manage, protect and access data across on-premises environments, private clouds and public clouds. Its offerings are designed to support enterprise workloads such as databases, business applications, artificial intelligence and virtualized computing.

The company’s portfolio includes all-flash and hybrid storage systems, cloud storage services, data management software and infrastructure-as-a-service solutions.