NetApp Sees Unusually Large Options Volume (NASDAQ:NTAP)

NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) saw unusually large options trading activity on Thursday. Investors purchased 12,474 call options on the company. This represents an increase of approximately 251% compared to the average daily volume of 3,554 call options.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

NTAP has been the subject of a number of recent analyst reports. Oppenheimer began coverage on NetApp in a report on Wednesday, November 13th. They issued a “market perform” rating for the company. Wedbush reiterated a “neutral” rating and issued a $120.00 target price on shares of NetApp in a research report on Friday, November 22nd. Northland Securities raised their price target on shares of NetApp from $108.00 to $120.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a research report on Friday, November 22nd. Citigroup upped their price target on shares of NetApp from $130.00 to $135.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Friday, November 22nd. Finally, TD Cowen upped their target price on shares of NetApp from $145.00 to $160.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, November 22nd. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have assigned a hold rating and seven have issued a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $139.20.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, President Cesar Cernuda sold 22,000 shares of NetApp stock in a transaction on Monday, December 30th. The shares were sold at an average price of $114.99, for a total transaction of $2,529,780.00. Following the sale, the president now owns 27,099 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $3,116,114.01. The trade was a 44.81 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, CEO George Kurian sold 8,500 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, December 16th. The stock was sold at an average price of $124.29, for a total transaction of $1,056,465.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 279,782 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $34,774,104.78. The trade was a 2.95 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last quarter, insiders sold 51,864 shares of company stock worth $6,185,830. Insiders own 0.47% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On NetApp

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the stock. Hollencrest Capital Management bought a new stake in shares of NetApp during the 2nd quarter valued at $26,000. Northwest Investment Counselors LLC bought a new stake in shares of NetApp during the third quarter valued at approximately $27,000. Redwood Wealth Management Group LLC purchased a new stake in NetApp during the second quarter valued at $32,000. True Wealth Design LLC raised its holdings in NetApp by 2,833.3% during the 3rd quarter. True Wealth Design LLC now owns 352 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $43,000 after buying an additional 340 shares during the period. Finally, Capital Performance Advisors LLP bought a new stake in NetApp in the third quarter worth about $44,000. 92.17% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

NetApp Stock Down 0.6 %

NTAP stock traded down $0.75 during mid-day trading on Thursday, hitting $115.33. 485,297 shares of the company were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 1,843,281. The firm has a market cap of $23.45 billion, a P/E ratio of 21.20, a P/E/G ratio of 2.92 and a beta of 1.23. The firm’s 50 day simple moving average is $121.23 and its 200 day simple moving average is $123.69. NetApp has a 1-year low of $83.62 and a 1-year high of $135.45. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.39, a quick ratio of 0.84 and a current ratio of 0.91.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last released 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 business had revenue of $1.66 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.65 billion. NetApp had a return on equity of 123.63% and a net margin of 17.78%. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 6.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the firm posted $1.23 EPS. On average, sell-side analysts predict that NetApp will post 5.83 EPS for the current fiscal year.

NetApp Announces Dividend

The firm 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 $0.52 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Friday, January 3rd. This represents a $2.08 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.80%. NetApp’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 38.24%.

About NetApp

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.