Vontobel Holding Ltd. Trims Stake in F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV)

Vontobel Holding Ltd. trimmed its holdings in shares of F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV) by 13.0% in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 69,234 shares of the network technology company’s stock after selling 10,376 shares during the quarter. Vontobel Holding Ltd. owned about 0.12% of F5 worth $12,392,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in FFIV. MetLife Investment Management LLC grew its position in F5 by 23.9% during the first quarter. MetLife Investment Management LLC now owns 16,515 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $3,451,000 after buying an additional 3,190 shares in the last quarter. Panagora Asset Management Inc. lifted its stake in F5 by 140.0% during the first quarter. Panagora Asset Management Inc. now owns 4,503 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $941,000 after purchasing an additional 2,627 shares during the last quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP lifted its stake in F5 by 1.3% during the first quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 394,157 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $82,367,000 after purchasing an additional 5,214 shares during the last quarter. Sei Investments Co. lifted its stake in F5 by 16.2% during the first quarter. Sei Investments Co. now owns 67,717 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $14,067,000 after purchasing an additional 9,454 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Prudential PLC bought a new stake in F5 during the first quarter worth about $327,000. 90.66% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

F5 Stock Down 2.2 %

FFIV opened at $183.78 on Tuesday. The firm has a 50 day moving average price of $188.26 and a 200-day moving average price of $175.08. F5, Inc. has a twelve month low of $127.05 and a twelve month high of $199.49. The stock has a market capitalization of $10.81 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 23.90, a PEG ratio of 2.77 and a beta of 1.11.

F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) last released its quarterly earnings data on Monday, January 29th. The network technology company reported $3.43 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.04 by $0.39. F5 had a net margin of 16.43% and a return on equity of 20.81%. The firm had revenue of $693.00 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $684.77 million. During the same period in the previous year, the company earned $1.65 earnings per share. The firm’s quarterly revenue was down 1.0% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, analysts expect that F5, Inc. will post 9.58 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Activity at F5

In other F5 news, CFO Francis J. Pelzer sold 500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, January 22nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $180.09, for a total value of $90,045.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer now directly owns 31,508 shares in the company, valued at $5,674,275.72. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. In other F5 news, CFO Francis J. Pelzer sold 500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, January 22nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $180.09, for a total value of $90,045.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer now directly owns 31,508 shares in the company, valued at $5,674,275.72. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, EVP Thomas Dean Fountain sold 851 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, February 8th. The stock was sold at an average price of $183.06, for a total transaction of $155,784.06. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president now owns 15,008 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,747,364.48. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last ninety days, insiders sold 10,201 shares of company stock worth $1,908,705. 0.58% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several equities research analysts have issued reports on the company. KeyCorp lifted their price target on F5 from $186.00 to $204.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 18th. Piper Sandler boosted their target price on F5 from $170.00 to $187.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Tuesday, January 30th. Barclays boosted their target price on F5 from $163.00 to $206.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Tuesday, January 30th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted their target price on F5 from $197.00 to $205.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday, April 11th. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada reissued a “sector perform” rating and issued a $204.00 target price on shares of F5 in a research note on Friday, February 9th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, seven have issued a hold rating, three have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $186.82.

F5 Company 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.