Core Alternative Capital Sells 855 Shares of NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP)

Core Alternative Capital lowered its stake in shares of NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) by 1.9% during the first quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The institutional investor owned 45,086 shares of the data storage provider’s stock after selling 855 shares during the quarter. Core Alternative Capital’s holdings in NetApp were worth $3,960,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its holdings in shares of NetApp by 1.7% during the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 26,443,974 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $3,069,617,000 after purchasing an additional 429,343 shares in the last quarter. Ameriprise Financial Inc. lifted its position in NetApp by 14.5% during the fourth quarter. Ameriprise Financial Inc. now owns 7,024,456 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $815,402,000 after purchasing an additional 888,671 shares during the period. Invesco Ltd. lifted its position in NetApp by 20.4% during the fourth quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 3,123,228 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $362,544,000 after purchasing an additional 529,471 shares during the period. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC grew its stake in NetApp by 8.0% during the fourth quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC now owns 2,986,330 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $346,653,000 after buying an additional 220,393 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Beutel Goodman & Co Ltd. increased its holdings in NetApp by 0.4% in the 4th quarter. Beutel Goodman & Co Ltd. now owns 2,887,795 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $335,215,000 after buying an additional 12,919 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 92.17% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several equities analysts have recently commented on NTAP shares. Wells Fargo & Company dropped their target price on shares of NetApp from $115.00 to $100.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, May 30th. UBS Group lowered their price objective on shares of NetApp from $115.00 to $108.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, May 30th. Evercore ISI reduced their target price on NetApp from $120.00 to $100.00 and set an “in-line” rating on the stock in a report on Monday, April 28th. Morgan Stanley reiterated a “cautious” rating on shares of NetApp in a research note on Tuesday, May 20th. Finally, Citigroup boosted their price target on NetApp from $105.00 to $110.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Monday, June 2nd. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have given a hold rating and six have issued a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $117.79.

Insider Activity at NetApp

In other news, CAO Lorenzo Daniel De sold 302 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, June 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $98.77, for a total transaction of $29,828.54. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief accounting officer owned 455 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $44,940.35. This trade represents a 39.89% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, CEO George Kurian sold 8,500 shares of NetApp stock in a transaction on Monday, April 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $81.83, for a total transaction of $695,555.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer owned 249,765 shares in the company, valued at approximately $20,438,269.95. This trade represents a 3.29% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last 90 days, insiders sold 17,302 shares of company stock valued at $1,590,514. Corporate insiders own 0.47% of the company’s stock.

NetApp Trading Down 0.1%

Shares of NTAP stock opened at $107.48 on Friday. NetApp, Inc. has a twelve month low of $71.84 and a twelve month high of $135.45. The stock’s fifty day simple moving average is $100.28 and its 200 day simple moving average is $103.63. The company has a quick ratio of 1.22, a current ratio of 1.25 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 2.39. The firm has a market capitalization of $21.53 billion, a P/E ratio of 18.92, a P/E/G ratio of 2.47 and a beta of 1.42.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, May 29th. The data storage provider reported $1.93 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.90 by $0.03. NetApp had a return on equity of 126.96% and a net margin of 18.05%. The firm had revenue of $1.73 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.72 billion. During the same period last year, the firm posted $1.80 earnings per share. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 3.8% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, sell-side analysts predict that NetApp, Inc. will post 5.89 EPS for the current fiscal year.

NetApp Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, July 23rd. Shareholders of record on Thursday, July 3rd will be issued a dividend of $0.52 per share. This represents a $2.08 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.94%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, July 3rd. NetApp’s payout ratio is 36.62%.

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.