Kesler Norman & Wride LLC Takes $326,000 Position in F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV)

Kesler Norman & Wride LLC purchased a new position in F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV) during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor purchased 1,296 shares of the network technology company’s stock, valued at approximately $326,000.

Several other hedge funds have also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Norges Bank purchased a new position in shares of F5 in the fourth quarter valued at $171,127,000. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership raised its position in F5 by 598.3% during the fourth quarter. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership now owns 425,275 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $106,944,000 after acquiring an additional 364,372 shares during the last quarter. Edge Capital Group LLC purchased a new stake in shares of F5 in the fourth quarter valued at about $59,623,000. Cookson Peirce & Co. Inc. acquired a new stake in shares of F5 in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $53,212,000. Finally, Point72 Asset Management L.P. purchased a new position in shares of F5 during the 3rd quarter worth approximately $35,090,000. 90.66% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

F5 Trading Up 1.5 %

NASDAQ:FFIV opened at $272.73 on Thursday. The firm’s fifty day simple moving average is $284.99 and its 200 day simple moving average is $256.04. The firm has a market capitalization of $15.72 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 27.11, a PEG ratio of 3.85 and a beta of 1.10. F5, Inc. has a twelve month low of $159.01 and a twelve month high of $313.00.

Insider Activity

In other F5 news, Director Marianne Budnik sold 728 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, January 30th. The stock was sold at an average price of $304.45, for a total transaction of $221,639.60. Following the sale, the director now owns 1,770 shares in the company, valued at $538,876.50. This represents a 29.14 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Also, EVP Chad Michael Whalen sold 4,093 shares of F5 stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, February 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $290.33, for a total value of $1,188,320.69. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president now owns 27,264 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $7,915,557.12. The trade was a 13.05 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last three months, insiders sold 18,232 shares of company stock worth $5,310,131. 0.52% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of equities research analysts recently issued reports on FFIV shares. Bank of America upped their target price on F5 from $180.00 to $260.00 and gave the company an “underperform” rating in a research note on Friday, January 31st. Piper Sandler lifted their price objective on F5 from $246.00 to $304.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday, January 29th. Royal Bank of Canada upped their target price on shares of F5 from $260.00 to $310.00 and gave the company a “sector perform” rating in a report on Wednesday, January 29th. Morgan Stanley lifted their price target on shares of F5 from $262.00 to $310.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Wednesday, January 29th. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group upped their price objective on shares of F5 from $257.00 to $295.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Wednesday, January 29th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, seven have issued a hold rating, one has issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $295.00.

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.