Legal & General Group Plc Takes Position in NetApp, Inc. $NTAP

Legal & General Group Plc purchased a new position in shares of NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) in the second quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The fund purchased 1,667,698 shares of the data storage provider’s stock, valued at approximately $258,093,000.

Several other institutional investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in the company. The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company bought a new position in shares of NetApp in the 2nd quarter valued at $18,950,000. Fiduciary Financial Advisors acquired a new stake in NetApp in the second quarter valued at about $109,000. Manning & Napier Advisors LLC acquired a new stake in NetApp in the second quarter valued at about $4,303,000. L2 Asset Management LLC bought a new position in NetApp in the second quarter valued at about $13,839,000. Finally, Cibc World Market Inc. bought a new position in NetApp in the second quarter valued at about $3,696,000. 92.17% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

NetApp Price Performance

Shares of NTAP opened at $193.85 on Thursday. The business has a 50-day moving average of $174.74 and a 200-day moving average of $137.07. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.84, a current ratio of 1.44 and a quick ratio of 1.39. The company has a market capitalization of $38.04 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 30.48, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.35 and a beta of 1.45. NetApp, Inc. has a 1 year low of $93.69 and a 1 year high of $209.06.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, May 28th. The data storage provider reported $2.03 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $2.27 by ($0.24). NetApp had a net margin of 18.43% and a return on equity of 117.23%. The company had revenue of $1.95 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.87 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company earned $1.93 earnings per share. The business’s revenue was up 12.5% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, equities research analysts anticipate that NetApp, Inc. will post 7.32 earnings per share for the current year.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of research analysts have recently commented on the stock. Wall Street Zen cut shares of NetApp from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, July 29th. Weiss Ratings raised shares of NetApp from a “hold (c+)” rating to a “buy (b-)” rating in a report on Monday, June 8th. Morgan Stanley upgraded shares of NetApp from an “underweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating and upped their price objective for the stock from $137.00 to $173.00 in a research report on Monday, August 10th. Wedbush increased their price objective on shares of NetApp from $115.00 to $150.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Friday, May 29th. Finally, Citigroup increased their price objective on shares of NetApp from $150.00 to $209.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Tuesday, August 18th. Five research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and ten have given a Hold rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $179.77.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other NetApp news, President Cesar Cernuda sold 2,608 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Monday, August 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $204.48, for a total value of $533,283.84. Following the completion of the sale, the president directly owned 46,530 shares in the company, valued at approximately $9,514,454.40. This trade represents a 5.31% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, CAO Lorenzo Daniel De sold 225 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, June 1st. The shares were sold at an average price of $171.09, for a total value of $38,495.25. Following the completion of the sale, the chief accounting officer directly owned 1,090 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $186,488.10. The trade was a 17.11% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. Insiders sold 55,297 shares of company stock valued at $8,758,016 over the last 90 days. Company insiders own 0.36% of the company’s stock.

NetApp Profile

NetApp, Inc (NASDAQ: NTAP) is a data management and storage company that delivers hybrid cloud data services for applications and data. Founded in 1992 as Network Appliance and rebranded as NetApp in 2008, the company is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California. NetApp’s offering focuses on enabling organizations to store, manage, protect and move data across on-premises environments and major public clouds.

The company’s product portfolio centers on the ONTAP data management software and a range of storage systems and services built around it.