F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) Sets New 12-Month High - Still a Buy?

F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV - Get Free Report) shares hit a new 52-week high during mid-day trading on Wednesday . The stock traded as high as $313.00 and last traded at $307.59, with a volume of 611066 shares changing hands. The stock had previously closed at $310.18.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several brokerages recently issued reports on FFIV. Evercore ISI upped their price objective on shares of F5 from $240.00 to $270.00 and gave the company an "in-line" rating in a research note on Friday, January 17th. StockNews.com raised shares of F5 from a "buy" rating to a "strong-buy" rating in a research note on Tuesday, October 29th. Piper Sandler increased their price target on shares of F5 from $246.00 to $304.00 and gave the stock a "neutral" rating in a research note on Wednesday, January 29th. Morgan Stanley increased their price target on shares of F5 from $262.00 to $310.00 and gave the stock an "equal weight" rating in a research note on Wednesday, January 29th. Finally, Barclays increased their price target on shares of F5 from $246.00 to $296.00 and gave the stock an "equal weight" rating in a research note on Wednesday, January 29th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, seven have assigned a hold rating, one has assigned a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company has a consensus rating of "Hold" and an average target price of $295.00.

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F5 Price Performance

The firm's 50-day moving average price is $275.62 and its 200-day moving average price is $241.08. The company has a market cap of $17.04 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 29.38, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.85 and a beta of 1.06.

F5 declared that its Board of Directors has authorized a stock buyback program on Monday, October 28th that authorizes the company to buyback $1.00 billion in shares. This buyback authorization authorizes the network technology company to purchase up to 7.9% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares buyback programs are generally an indication that the company's board of directors believes its shares are undervalued.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other F5 news, CEO Francois Locoh-Donou sold 6,500 shares of the firm's stock in a transaction on Wednesday, February 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $303.06, for a total transaction of $1,969,890.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 151,247 shares of the company's stock, valued at $45,836,915.82. This trade represents a 4.12 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Also, Director Marianne Budnik sold 728 shares of the firm's stock in a transaction on Thursday, January 30th. The stock was sold at an average price of $304.45, for a total transaction of $221,639.60. Following the transaction, the director now directly owns 1,770 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $538,876.50. This represents a 29.14 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 11,574 shares of company stock valued at $3,455,057 in the last ninety days. Corporate insiders own 0.52% of the company's stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of large investors have recently modified their holdings of the business. Mackenzie Financial Corp lifted its position in shares of F5 by 7.0% in the 4th quarter. Mackenzie Financial Corp now owns 5,462 shares of the network technology company's stock worth $1,374,000 after buying an additional 357 shares during the last quarter. Forum Financial Management LP bought a new position in shares of F5 in the 4th quarter worth about $304,000. Vise Technologies Inc. bought a new position in shares of F5 in the 4th quarter worth about $606,000. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC lifted its position in shares of F5 by 21.9% in the 4th quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC now owns 650,992 shares of the network technology company's stock worth $163,705,000 after buying an additional 116,785 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Vident Advisory LLC lifted its position in shares of F5 by 92.1% in the 4th quarter. Vident Advisory LLC now owns 3,734 shares of the network technology company's stock worth $939,000 after buying an additional 1,790 shares during the last quarter. 90.66% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

About F5

F5, Inc provides multi-cloud application security and delivery solutions in the United States, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and the Asia Pacific region. The company's distributed cloud services enable its customers to deploy, secure, and operate applications in any architecture, from on-premises to the public cloud.