Park Avenue Securities LLC Has $268,000 Position in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP)

Park Avenue Securities LLC increased its position in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP – Get Rating) by 6.2% in the 3rd quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The institutional investor owned 4,337 shares of the data storage provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 255 shares during the quarter. Park Avenue Securities LLC’s holdings in NetApp were worth $268,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Assetmark Inc. increased its stake in shares of NetApp by 31.0% in the third quarter. Assetmark Inc. now owns 20,030 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $1,239,000 after buying an additional 4,739 shares during the period. Mitsubishi UFJ Kokusai Asset Management Co. Ltd. increased its position in NetApp by 10.7% during the 3rd quarter. Mitsubishi UFJ Kokusai Asset Management Co. Ltd. now owns 183,492 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $11,349,000 after purchasing an additional 17,703 shares during the period. Alaska Permanent Fund Corp increased its position in NetApp by 59.6% during the 3rd quarter. Alaska Permanent Fund Corp now owns 61,241 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $3,788,000 after purchasing an additional 22,878 shares during the period. Pinnacle Associates Ltd. increased its position in NetApp by 79.6% during the 3rd quarter. Pinnacle Associates Ltd. now owns 13,509 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $836,000 after purchasing an additional 5,988 shares during the period. Finally, SG Americas Securities LLC increased its position in NetApp by 120.8% during the 3rd quarter. SG Americas Securities LLC now owns 144,095 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $8,912,000 after purchasing an additional 78,826 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 87.92% of the company’s stock.

Insider Activity

In other news, Director Carrie Palin sold 2,707 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Monday, December 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $64.30, for a total transaction of $174,060.10. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. In other news, Director Carrie Palin sold 2,707 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Monday, December 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $64.30, for a total transaction of $174,060.10. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. Also, CEO George Kurian sold 2,250 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, January 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $60.40, for a total value of $135,900.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 156,976 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $9,481,350.40. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 11,707 shares of company stock valued at $748,890 in the last ninety days. 0.26% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of analysts have weighed in on NTAP shares. Barclays downgraded shares of NetApp from an “overweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating and decreased their target price for the company from $83.00 to $71.00 in a research report on Tuesday, January 10th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. downgraded shares of NetApp from an “overweight” rating to a “neutral” rating and decreased their target price for the company from $90.00 to $71.00 in a research report on Tuesday, December 20th. Raymond James reduced their price objective on shares of NetApp from $105.00 to $80.00 in a research report on Wednesday, November 30th. Wedbush reduced their price objective on shares of NetApp from $80.00 to $70.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday, November 30th. Finally, Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft reduced their price objective on shares of NetApp from $84.00 to $78.00 in a research report on Wednesday, November 30th. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have given a hold rating and ten have issued a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $77.95.

NetApp Price Performance

Shares of NASDAQ:NTAP opened at $67.01 on Tuesday. The company has a current ratio of 1.36, a quick ratio of 1.28 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.99. The stock’s fifty day simple moving average is $65.17 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $67.58. NetApp, Inc. has a 1-year low of $58.08 and a 1-year high of $92.40. The stock has a market cap of $14.45 billion, a PE ratio of 10.14, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.71 and a beta of 1.18.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP – Get Rating) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, November 29th. The data storage provider reported $1.20 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.08 by $0.12. NetApp had a return on equity of 115.30% and a net margin of 22.52%. The business had revenue of $1.66 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.67 billion. As a group, analysts forecast that NetApp, Inc. will post 4.37 EPS for the current fiscal year.

NetApp Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, January 25th. Shareholders of record on Friday, January 6th will be paid a dividend of $0.50 per share. This represents a $2.00 annualized dividend and a yield of 2.98%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, January 5th. NetApp’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 30.26%.

About NetApp

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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, NetApp ElementOS software, and NetApp SANtricity software; and storage infrastructure solutions, including NetApp All-Flash FAS series, NetApp Fabric Attached Storage, NetApp FlexPod, NetApp E/EF series, NetApp StorageGRID, and NetApp SolidFire.