F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) Shares Gap Down Following Analyst Downgrade

F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV) shares gapped down before the market opened on Tuesday after Royal Bank of Canada lowered their price target on the stock from $204.00 to $182.00. The stock had previously closed at $182.13, but opened at $162.25. Royal Bank of Canada currently has a sector perform rating on the stock. F5 shares last traded at $165.96, with a volume of 464,497 shares changing hands.

Several other research firms also recently commented on FFIV. KeyCorp increased their price objective on F5 from $186.00 to $204.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Thursday, January 18th. Evercore ISI cut their price target on F5 from $200.00 to $180.00 and set an “in-line” rating for the company in a research note on Tuesday. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted their price objective on F5 from $197.00 to $205.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday, April 11th. Barclays dropped their price objective on shares of F5 from $206.00 to $189.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a report on Tuesday. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group lifted their target price on shares of F5 from $156.00 to $179.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Tuesday, January 30th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, seven have assigned a hold rating, two have given a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, F5 has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $185.10.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other F5 news, CFO Francis J. Pelzer sold 500 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, March 20th. The shares were sold at an average price of $189.12, for a total value of $94,560.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer now owns 31,790 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $6,012,124.80. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. In other F5 news, EVP Thomas Dean Fountain sold 851 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, February 8th. The shares were sold at an average price of $183.06, for a total value of $155,784.06. Following the transaction, the executive vice president now owns 15,008 shares in the company, valued at $2,747,364.48. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, CFO Francis J. Pelzer sold 500 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, March 20th. The stock was sold at an average price of $189.12, for a total value of $94,560.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief financial officer now owns 31,790 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $6,012,124.80. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 10,201 shares of company stock worth $1,908,065 over the last ninety days. 0.58% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Trading of F5

Several institutional investors and hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Commerce Bank increased its stake in shares of F5 by 3.1% during the fourth quarter. Commerce Bank now owns 1,912 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $342,000 after purchasing an additional 57 shares in the last quarter. Optimum Investment Advisors grew its stake in shares of F5 by 5.5% in the fourth quarter. Optimum Investment Advisors now owns 1,150 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $206,000 after acquiring an additional 60 shares during the period. Cary Street Partners Investment Advisory LLC raised its stake in F5 by 15.9% during the 3rd quarter. Cary Street Partners Investment Advisory LLC now owns 518 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $83,000 after buying an additional 71 shares during the last quarter. Addison Advisors LLC grew its position in F5 by 36.1% during the third quarter. Addison Advisors LLC now owns 279 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $45,000 after buying an additional 74 shares during the period. Finally, Czech National Bank raised its holdings in F5 by 0.8% in the 4th quarter. Czech National Bank now owns 10,457 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $1,872,000 after purchasing an additional 84 shares during the period. 90.66% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

F5 Stock Up 0.8 %

The stock’s 50 day moving average price is $187.30 and its 200-day moving average price is $176.82. The stock has a market capitalization of $9.80 billion, a PE ratio of 19.95, a PEG ratio of 2.68 and a beta of 1.11.

F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Monday, April 29th. The network technology company reported $2.91 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.88 by $0.03. The company had revenue of $681.00 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $685.47 million. F5 had a net margin of 17.91% and a return on equity of 21.72%. F5’s revenue for the quarter was down 3.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $1.70 EPS. On average, analysts forecast that F5, Inc. will post 9.59 earnings per share for the current year.

About F5

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.