O Shaughnessy Asset Management LLC Purchases 109,503 Shares of NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP)

O Shaughnessy Asset Management LLC raised its stake in shares of NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) by 446.3% in the 1st quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The institutional investor owned 134,037 shares of the data storage provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 109,503 shares during the quarter. O Shaughnessy Asset Management LLC’s holdings in NetApp were worth $14,070,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other institutional investors also recently modified their holdings of the company. J.Safra Asset Management Corp grew its position in shares of NetApp by 706.3% during the 1st quarter. J.Safra Asset Management Corp now owns 258 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $27,000 after buying an additional 226 shares during the period. Rise Advisors LLC acquired a new position in shares of NetApp in the 1st quarter valued at approximately $27,000. ORG Partners LLC grew its position in shares of NetApp by 14,650.0% in the 4th quarter. ORG Partners LLC now owns 295 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $26,000 after purchasing an additional 293 shares during the period. First Horizon Advisors Inc. grew its position in shares of NetApp by 58.7% in the 4th quarter. First Horizon Advisors Inc. now owns 311 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $27,000 after purchasing an additional 115 shares during the period. Finally, UMB Bank n.a. grew its position in shares of NetApp by 82.9% in the 4th quarter. UMB Bank n.a. now owns 331 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $29,000 after purchasing an additional 150 shares during the period. 92.17% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

NetApp Stock Up 0.7 %

Shares of NetApp stock traded up $0.86 on Tuesday, reaching $129.20. 1,043,532 shares of the company were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 1,968,137. NetApp, Inc. has a one year low of $70.82 and a one year high of $135.01. The company has a market capitalization of $26.59 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 27.66, a PEG ratio of 5.11 and a beta of 1.27. The company has a current ratio of 1.19, a quick ratio of 1.15 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.74. The company has a 50-day moving average of $123.69 and a 200 day moving average of $106.12.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, May 30th. The data storage provider reported $1.80 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.48 by $0.32. NetApp had a return on equity of 114.54% and a net margin of 15.73%. The company had revenue of $1.67 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.65 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business posted $1.20 EPS. The business’s revenue was up 5.5% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, equities research analysts forecast that NetApp, Inc. will post 5.47 earnings per share for the current year.

NetApp declared that its Board of Directors has approved a share repurchase plan on Thursday, May 30th that permits the company to repurchase $1.00 billion in outstanding shares. This repurchase authorization permits the data storage provider to purchase up to 4% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase plans are generally an indication that the company’s board of directors believes its stock is undervalued.

NetApp Increases Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, July 24th. Investors of record on Friday, July 5th will be paid a $0.52 dividend. This represents a $2.08 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.61%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, July 5th. This is a boost from NetApp’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.50. NetApp’s dividend payout ratio is 44.83%.

Insider Activity at NetApp

In related news, Director Thomas Michael Nevens sold 3,334 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, June 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $127.33, for a total value of $424,518.22. Following the sale, the director now owns 11,455 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,458,565.15. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. In related news, Director Thomas Michael Nevens sold 3,334 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, June 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $127.33, for a total value of $424,518.22. Following the sale, the director now owns 11,455 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,458,565.15. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, President Cesar Cernuda sold 22,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, June 28th. The shares were sold at an average price of $129.46, for a total value of $2,848,120.00. Following the completion of the sale, the president now owns 64,789 shares in the company, valued at approximately $8,387,583.94. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last quarter, insiders have sold 41,786 shares of company stock worth $5,395,146. Company insiders own 0.37% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several brokerages recently issued reports on NTAP. Argus boosted their price objective on NetApp from $130.00 to $140.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, June 5th. Bank of America boosted their price objective on NetApp from $85.00 to $100.00 and gave the company an “underperform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, May 29th. Barclays boosted their target price on NetApp from $100.00 to $116.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Friday, May 31st. Stifel Nicolaus boosted their target price on NetApp from $130.00 to $138.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, June 12th. Finally, Wedbush restated a “neutral” rating and issued a $120.00 target price on shares of NetApp in a research note on Wednesday, June 12th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, eleven have given a hold rating and six have assigned a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $117.81.

NetApp 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.