State Street Corp Acquires 16,663 Shares of F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV)

State Street Corp grew its holdings in shares of F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV - Free Report) by 0.5% during the third quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 3,187,222 shares of the network technology company's stock after buying an additional 16,663 shares during the period. State Street Corp owned approximately 5.47% of F5 worth $701,825,000 as of its most recent filing with the SEC.

A number of other large investors also recently modified their holdings of the company. Hotchkis & Wiley Capital Management LLC lifted its holdings in shares of F5 by 3.6% in the 3rd quarter. Hotchkis & Wiley Capital Management LLC now owns 5,489,388 shares of the network technology company's stock worth $1,208,763,000 after purchasing an additional 191,020 shares in the last quarter. American Century Companies Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of F5 by 10.5% in the 2nd quarter. American Century Companies Inc. now owns 1,709,296 shares of the network technology company's stock worth $294,392,000 after purchasing an additional 162,820 shares in the last quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of F5 by 6,700.2% in the 2nd quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. now owns 848,388 shares of the network technology company's stock worth $146,118,000 after purchasing an additional 835,912 shares in the last quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC lifted its holdings in shares of F5 by 48.9% in the 2nd quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 652,972 shares of the network technology company's stock worth $111,932,000 after purchasing an additional 214,351 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Dimensional Fund Advisors LP lifted its holdings in shares of F5 by 8.9% in the 2nd quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 598,605 shares of the network technology company's stock worth $103,096,000 after purchasing an additional 48,742 shares in the last quarter. 90.66% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of brokerages recently issued reports on FFIV. Morgan Stanley increased their target price on F5 from $215.00 to $230.00 and gave the stock an "equal weight" rating in a report on Tuesday, October 29th. The Goldman Sachs Group increased their price target on F5 from $212.00 to $241.00 and gave the company a "neutral" rating in a research report on Tuesday, October 29th. Royal Bank of Canada increased their price target on F5 from $205.00 to $240.00 and gave the company a "sector perform" rating in a research report on Tuesday, October 29th. Barclays increased their price target on F5 from $214.00 to $246.00 and gave the company an "equal weight" rating in a research report on Tuesday, October 29th. Finally, StockNews.com raised F5 from a "buy" rating to a "strong-buy" rating in a research report on Tuesday, October 29th. Seven research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, two have assigned a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company's stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of "Hold" and a consensus target price of $233.56.

F5 Price Performance

Shares of F5 stock traded up $0.78 during trading hours on Monday, hitting $257.92. 510,196 shares of the company's stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 531,453. F5, Inc. has a 12-month low of $159.01 and a 12-month high of $260.01. The stock has a market capitalization of $15.12 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 26.98, a PEG ratio of 3.48 and a beta of 1.06. The company has a fifty day simple moving average of $233.39 and a 200-day simple moving average of $202.67.

F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV - Get Free Report) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Monday, October 28th. The network technology company reported $3.67 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.45 by $0.22. F5 had a return on equity of 20.80% and a net margin of 20.13%. The company had revenue of $747.00 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $730.43 million. During the same quarter last year, the firm posted $2.76 EPS. The firm's revenue for the quarter was up 5.7% on a year-over-year basis. On average, analysts forecast that F5, Inc. will post 11.01 EPS for the current fiscal year.

F5 announced that its Board of Directors has initiated a share buyback plan on Monday, October 28th that allows the company to buyback $1.00 billion in shares. This buyback authorization allows the network technology company to reacquire up to 7.9% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback plans are generally an indication that the company's management believes its stock is undervalued.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other F5 news, CEO Francois Locoh-Donou sold 1,450 shares of the firm's stock in a transaction dated Thursday, October 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $218.26, for a total value of $316,477.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 121,122 shares in the company, valued at $26,436,087.72. This trade represents a 1.18 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, CFO Francis J. Pelzer sold 600 shares of the firm's stock in a transaction dated Friday, September 20th. The stock was sold at an average price of $217.50, for a total value of $130,500.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer now owns 30,425 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $6,617,437.50. This represents a 1.93 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last 90 days, insiders sold 3,475 shares of company stock valued at $775,389. 0.58% of the stock is owned by insiders.

F5 Profile

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.