Bank of New Hampshire Raises Stock Position in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP)

Bank of New Hampshire grew its stake in shares of NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) by 2.2% in the 4th quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 14,734 shares of the data storage provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 312 shares during the period. Bank of New Hampshire’s holdings in NetApp were worth $1,710,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other large investors have also recently modified their holdings of the company. Commonwealth Equity Services LLC lifted its holdings in shares of NetApp by 2.8% in the 2nd quarter. Commonwealth Equity Services LLC now owns 23,584 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $3,038,000 after buying an additional 639 shares during the period. Candriam S.C.A. grew its holdings in NetApp by 18.3% during the 2nd quarter. Candriam S.C.A. now owns 12,536 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $1,615,000 after acquiring an additional 1,938 shares in the last quarter. Savant Capital LLC increased its position in NetApp by 651.5% during the 2nd quarter. Savant Capital LLC now owns 19,050 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $2,454,000 after purchasing an additional 16,515 shares during the period. Caprock Group LLC raised its holdings in shares of NetApp by 234.0% in the 2nd quarter. Caprock Group LLC now owns 7,818 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $1,007,000 after purchasing an additional 5,477 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Ballentine Partners LLC lifted its position in shares of NetApp by 11.3% in the 2nd quarter. Ballentine Partners LLC now owns 2,638 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $340,000 after purchasing an additional 268 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 92.17% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several equities analysts recently issued reports on NTAP shares. Stifel Nicolaus lifted their price objective on shares of NetApp from $140.00 to $145.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, November 22nd. Oppenheimer started coverage on NetApp in a research note on Wednesday, November 13th. They set a “market perform” rating for the company. Northland Securities lifted their target price on NetApp from $108.00 to $120.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a research note on Friday, November 22nd. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upgraded shares of NetApp from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and set a $160.00 price objective for the company in a research note on Monday, December 16th. Finally, Morgan Stanley boosted their target price on NetApp from $132.00 to $146.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Tuesday, December 17th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have given a hold rating and seven have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, NetApp has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $139.20.

NetApp Price Performance

NTAP stock traded up $0.93 during midday trading on Tuesday, reaching $118.93. The stock had a trading volume of 94,127 shares, compared to its average volume of 950,714. NetApp, Inc. has a 52-week low of $83.62 and a 52-week high of $135.45. The company has a current ratio of 0.91, a quick ratio of 0.84 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.39. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $121.06 and its 200 day simple moving average is $123.44. The company has a market cap of $24.18 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 21.86, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.92 and a beta of 1.23.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, November 21st. The data storage provider reported $1.87 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.78 by $0.09. The firm had revenue of $1.66 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.65 billion. NetApp had a net margin of 17.78% and a return on equity of 123.63%. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 6.1% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the firm posted $1.23 earnings per share. As a group, sell-side analysts predict that NetApp, Inc. will post 5.83 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

NetApp Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, January 22nd. Shareholders of record on Friday, January 3rd will be paid a dividend of $0.52 per share. This represents a $2.08 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.75%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, January 3rd. NetApp’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 38.24%.

Insider Buying and Selling at NetApp

In related news, CEO George Kurian sold 8,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, October 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $126.11, for a total value of $1,071,935.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 292,778 shares in the company, valued at approximately $36,922,233.58. This represents a 2.82 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this link. Also, EVP Elizabeth M. O’callahan sold 705 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, October 10th. The stock was sold at an average price of $126.20, for a total value of $88,971.00. Following the sale, the executive vice president now directly owns 11,694 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,475,782.80. This trade represents a 5.69 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 51,864 shares of company stock worth $6,185,830 in the last three months. 0.47% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

NetApp Company 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.