Ibex Wealth Advisors Takes $383,000 Position in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP)

Ibex Wealth Advisors bought a new stake in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP - Free Report) during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The fund bought 3,301 shares of the data storage provider's stock, valued at approximately $383,000.

Several other hedge funds also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Northwest Investment Counselors LLC bought a new position in shares of NetApp during the 3rd quarter valued at $27,000. True Wealth Design LLC raised its holdings in NetApp by 2,833.3% during the third quarter. True Wealth Design LLC now owns 352 shares of the data storage provider's stock valued at $43,000 after buying an additional 340 shares in the last quarter. Capital Performance Advisors LLP acquired a new stake in shares of NetApp in the third quarter worth about $44,000. Ashton Thomas Securities LLC bought a new stake in shares of NetApp during the 3rd quarter worth about $51,000. Finally, Geneos Wealth Management Inc. increased its holdings in shares of NetApp by 22.3% during the 4th quarter. Geneos Wealth Management Inc. now owns 549 shares of the data storage provider's stock valued at $64,000 after acquiring an additional 100 shares during the last quarter. 92.17% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, CAO Lorenzo Daniel De sold 326 shares of the company's stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, November 18th. The shares were sold at an average price of $117.44, for a total transaction of $38,285.44. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. Also, CEO George Kurian sold 8,500 shares of the company's stock in a transaction on Monday, November 18th. The stock was sold at an average price of $118.00, for a total transaction of $1,003,000.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 288,282 shares of the company's stock, valued at $34,017,276. This trade represents a 2.86 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 51,610 shares of company stock worth $6,123,351 in the last quarter. 0.47% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

NetApp Stock Up 2.2 %

Shares of NASDAQ:NTAP traded up $2.60 during midday trading on Thursday, hitting $122.88. The stock had a trading volume of 525,781 shares, compared to its average volume of 1,328,480. The company has a market cap of $24.98 billion, a P/E ratio of 22.55, a PEG ratio of 2.99 and a beta of 1.23. NetApp, Inc. has a 12 month low of $83.80 and a 12 month high of $135.45. The business's 50-day simple moving average is $121.31 and its 200-day simple moving average is $122.37. The company has a quick ratio of 0.84, a current ratio of 0.91 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.39.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP - Get Free Report) last released its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, November 21st. The data storage provider reported $1.87 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.78 by $0.09. The company had revenue of $1.66 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.65 billion. NetApp had a net margin of 17.78% and a return on equity of 123.63%. NetApp's revenue for the quarter was up 6.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the business earned $1.23 EPS. On average, sell-side analysts forecast that NetApp, Inc. will post 5.89 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

NetApp Announces Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, January 22nd. Investors of record on Friday, January 3rd were given a dividend of $0.52 per share. This represents a $2.08 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.69%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, January 3rd. NetApp's dividend payout ratio is 38.24%.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities analysts have recently commented on the stock. TD Cowen lifted their price target on shares of NetApp from $145.00 to $160.00 and gave the company a "buy" rating in a research report on Friday, November 22nd. Bank of America lifted their target price on shares of NetApp from $115.00 to $121.00 and gave the stock an "underperform" rating in a report on Friday, November 22nd. Barclays upped their price target on shares of NetApp from $119.00 to $132.00 and gave the company an "equal weight" rating in a report on Friday, November 22nd. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their price objective on NetApp from $135.00 to $140.00 and gave the stock an "equal weight" rating in a research note on Friday, November 22nd. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. upgraded NetApp from a "neutral" rating to an "overweight" rating and set a $160.00 target price for the company in a research note on Monday, December 16th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have assigned a hold rating and seven have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of "Hold" and an average target price of $139.20.

NetApp Company Profile

NetApp, Inc provides cloud-led and data-centric services to manage and share data on-premises, and private and public clouds worldwide. It operates in two segments, Hybrid Cloud and Public Could. The company offers intelligent data management software, such as NetApp ONTAP, NetApp Snapshot, NetApp SnapCenter Backup Management, NetApp SnapMirror Data Replication, NetApp SnapLock Data Compliance, and storage infrastructure solutions, including NetApp All-Flash FAS series, NetApp Fabric Attached Storage, NetApp E/EF series, and NetApp StorageGRID.