Easterly Investment Partners LLC Has $990,000 Stock Holdings in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP)

Easterly Investment Partners LLC lowered its holdings in shares of NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) by 49.9% in the 3rd quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The firm owned 8,019 shares of the data storage provider’s stock after selling 8,000 shares during the period. Easterly Investment Partners LLC’s holdings in NetApp were worth $990,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other hedge funds have also added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Bessemer Group Inc. boosted its holdings in shares of NetApp by 46.1% during the 1st quarter. Bessemer Group Inc. now owns 16,720 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $1,754,000 after buying an additional 5,273 shares in the last quarter. Headlands Technologies LLC bought a new position in NetApp during the first quarter worth $473,000. Russell Investments Group Ltd. grew its holdings in NetApp by 60.5% in the first quarter. Russell Investments Group Ltd. now owns 527,064 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $55,355,000 after purchasing an additional 198,627 shares during the period. National Bank of Canada FI increased its stake in NetApp by 221.9% in the first quarter. National Bank of Canada FI now owns 301,699 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $32,731,000 after purchasing an additional 207,968 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Sei Investments Co. raised its holdings in shares of NetApp by 63.9% during the first quarter. Sei Investments Co. now owns 343,218 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $36,025,000 after purchasing an additional 133,813 shares during the period. 92.17% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

NetApp Price Performance

Shares of NASDAQ:NTAP opened at $124.01 on Friday. The company has a market capitalization of $25.39 billion, a P/E ratio of 24.22, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 4.55 and a beta of 1.24. The company’s 50-day moving average is $121.01 and its 200 day moving average is $121.17. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.34, a quick ratio of 0.91 and a current ratio of 0.96. NetApp, Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $75.32 and a fifty-two week high of $135.01.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, August 28th. The data storage provider reported $1.56 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.45 by $0.11. NetApp had a net margin of 17.01% and a return on equity of 121.41%. The firm had revenue of $1.54 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.53 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the company earned $0.84 earnings per share. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 7.6% on a year-over-year basis. On average, equities research analysts forecast that NetApp, Inc. will post 5.71 earnings per share for the current year.

NetApp Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, October 23rd. Shareholders of record on Friday, October 4th were given a $0.52 dividend. This represents a $2.08 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.68%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, October 4th. NetApp’s dividend payout ratio is currently 40.63%.

Insider Buying and Selling at NetApp

In related news, CAO Lorenzo Daniel De sold 1,685 shares of NetApp stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, September 24th. The stock was sold at an average price of $123.60, for a total value of $208,266.00. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. In other NetApp news, EVP Elizabeth M. O’callahan sold 705 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, October 10th. The shares were sold at an average price of $126.20, for a total transaction of $88,971.00. Following the sale, the executive vice president now owns 11,694 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,475,782.80. The trade was a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Also, CAO Lorenzo Daniel De sold 1,685 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, September 24th. The stock was sold at an average price of $123.60, for a total value of $208,266.00. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 10,890 shares of company stock worth $1,369,172 over the last ninety days. 0.47% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of analysts recently commented on NTAP shares. Loop Capital raised NetApp from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and boosted their target price for the company from $121.00 to $150.00 in a research report on Tuesday, September 3rd. Stifel Nicolaus increased their target price on NetApp from $138.00 to $140.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, August 29th. Evercore ISI boosted their price target on shares of NetApp from $120.00 to $130.00 and gave the company an “in-line” rating in a research note on Monday, August 12th. UBS Group raised their price objective on shares of NetApp from $121.00 to $134.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday, August 29th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted their target price on shares of NetApp from $146.00 to $147.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Thursday, August 29th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have issued a hold rating and six have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, NetApp has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $129.06.

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.