Pension & Wealth Management Advisors Inc. Makes New Investment in NetApp, Inc. $NTAP

Pension & Wealth Management Advisors Inc. acquired a new position in shares of NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) during the third quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm acquired 2,470 shares of the data storage provider’s stock, valued at approximately $519,000.

Several other institutional investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in NTAP. Howard Capital Management LLC acquired a new stake in shares of NetApp in the 3rd quarter valued at about $226,000. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. lifted its holdings in shares of NetApp by 21.7% in the third quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 414,095 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $86,993,000 after purchasing an additional 73,965 shares in the last quarter. Mystic Asset Management Inc. acquired a new position in shares of NetApp during the third quarter worth about $212,000. WealthPlan Investment Management LLC acquired a new position in shares of NetApp during the third quarter worth about $200,000. Finally, Mather Group LLC. grew its holdings in shares of NetApp by 11.0% during the third quarter. Mather Group LLC. now owns 6,263 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $1,316,000 after buying an additional 622 shares in the last quarter. 92.17% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

NetApp Stock Down 5.1%

Shares of NetApp stock traded down $10.90 during trading hours on Friday, reaching $203.80. 3,217,450 shares of the company’s stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 2,725,941. The company has a 50 day moving average of $201.97 and a two-hundred day moving average of $163.26. NetApp, Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $93.69 and a fifty-two week high of $240.87. The company has a current ratio of 1.24, a quick ratio of 1.16 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.30. The stock has a market cap of $40.03 billion, a P/E ratio of 28.74, a P/E/G ratio of 2.31 and a beta of 1.46.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, September 2nd. The data storage provider reported $2.58 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.12 by $0.46. The company had revenue of $2.02 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.84 billion. NetApp had a return on equity of 119.13% and a net margin of 19.18%. NetApp’s revenue for the quarter was up 29.9% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter last year, the company earned $1.15 EPS. NetApp has set its FY 2027 guidance at 9.730-10.030 EPS and its Q2 2027 guidance at 2.540-2.640 EPS. On average, sell-side analysts forecast that NetApp, Inc. will post 8.32 EPS for the current fiscal year.

NetApp Announces Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, October 28th. Shareholders of record on Friday, October 9th will be paid a $0.52 dividend. This represents a $2.08 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.0%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, October 9th. NetApp’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 29.34%.

Insider Transactions at NetApp

In other NetApp news, Director Thomas Nevens sold 5,940 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, September 11th. The stock was sold at an average price of $195.21, for a total transaction of $1,159,547.40. Following the transaction, the director owned 7,747 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,512,291.87. The trade was a 43.40% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. Also, Director Carrie Palin sold 5,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, October 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $216.43, for a total value of $1,082,150.00. Following the sale, the director owned 6,660 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,441,423.80. This represents a 42.88% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. Over the last 90 days, insiders sold 173,524 shares of company stock valued at $35,018,126. 0.36% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities research analysts recently issued reports on NTAP shares. Evercore raised NetApp from an “in-line” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $300.00 target price on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, October 7th. Argus set a $225.00 target price on NetApp in a research note on Friday, September 11th. Weiss Ratings raised NetApp from a “buy (b-)” rating to a “buy (b)” rating in a research report on Thursday, October 8th. The Goldman Sachs Group reaffirmed a “buy” rating and set a $240.00 price target on shares of NetApp in a research note on Tuesday, October 6th. Finally, Morgan Stanley lifted their price objective on shares of NetApp from $173.00 to $191.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a report on Thursday, September 3rd. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, eight have issued a Buy rating and ten have given a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $213.20.

About NetApp

NetApp, Inc develops intelligent data infrastructure and data management solutions for enterprises, service providers, and government organizations. The company helps customers store, manage, protect, and access data across on-premises environments, private clouds, public clouds, and hybrid multicloud infrastructures.

Its portfolio includes enterprise storage systems, all-flash arrays, cloud-connected storage, object storage, and data management software. NetApp’s offerings include the ONTAP data management operating system, AFF and ASA storage systems, StorageGRID object storage, and BlueXP, a platform designed to help customers manage data and storage resources across multiple environments.