F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV) Receives Consensus Recommendation of “Hold” from Analysts

F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV) has earned an average rating of “Hold” from the nine research firms that are covering the stock, MarketBeat Ratings reports. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell recommendation, seven have issued a hold recommendation and one has issued a buy recommendation on the company. The average 1 year target price among brokerages that have covered the stock in the last year is $282.56.

A number of equities analysts recently weighed in on FFIV shares. Wall Street Zen downgraded shares of F5 from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, May 22nd. Barclays lowered their target price on shares of F5 from $296.00 to $274.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a report on Tuesday, April 29th. Morgan Stanley boosted their target price on shares of F5 from $269.00 to $280.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Tuesday, April 29th. William Blair restated an “outperform” rating on shares of F5 in a report on Tuesday, April 29th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. lowered their target price on shares of F5 from $296.00 to $285.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, April 17th.

F5 Stock Performance

Shares of F5 stock opened at $287.13 on Wednesday. The business’s 50 day simple moving average is $277.78 and its 200 day simple moving average is $273.91. F5 has a 52-week low of $167.35 and a 52-week high of $313.00. The firm has a market cap of $16.49 billion, a PE ratio of 27.24, a P/E/G ratio of 3.65 and a beta of 1.00.

F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Monday, April 28th. The network technology company reported $3.42 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.11 by $0.31. F5 had a return on equity of 21.18% and a net margin of 21.14%. The firm had revenue of $590.16 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $719.91 million. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $2.91 EPS. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 7.3% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, equities research analysts predict that F5 will post 11.2 EPS for the current year.

Insider Transactions at F5

In other news, CEO Francois Locoh-Donou sold 1,300 shares of F5 stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, May 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $264.54, for a total transaction of $343,902.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 151,700 shares in the company, valued at approximately $40,130,718. The trade was a 0.85% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. Also, EVP Thomas Dean Fountain sold 1,347 shares of F5 stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, May 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $269.03, for a total value of $362,383.41. Following the transaction, the executive vice president now owns 20,660 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $5,558,159.80. This represents a 6.12% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last three months, insiders sold 8,519 shares of company stock worth $2,370,959. 0.52% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Institutional Trading of F5

Institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Annis Gardner Whiting Capital Advisors LLC boosted its stake in F5 by 134.1% in the 1st quarter. Annis Gardner Whiting Capital Advisors LLC now owns 103 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $27,000 after purchasing an additional 59 shares during the period. Golden State Wealth Management LLC boosted its stake in F5 by 275.0% in the 1st quarter. Golden State Wealth Management LLC now owns 105 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $28,000 after purchasing an additional 77 shares during the period. Park Square Financial Group LLC bought a new stake in F5 in the 4th quarter valued at $31,000. Groupe la Francaise bought a new stake in F5 in the 1st quarter valued at $34,000. Finally, Crowley Wealth Management Inc. bought a new stake in F5 in the 4th quarter valued at $35,000. 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.