Piper Sandler Forecasts Strong Price Appreciation for F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) Stock

F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) had its price objective hoisted by stock analysts at Piper Sandler from $246.00 to $304.00 in a research report issued on Wednesday,Benzinga reports. The firm presently has a “neutral” rating on the network technology company’s stock. Piper Sandler’s price objective points to a potential upside of 4.46% from the company’s previous close.

A number of other equities research analysts have also recently weighed in on the company. StockNews.com upgraded F5 from a “buy” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, October 29th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased their price target on shares of F5 from $225.00 to $250.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Tuesday, October 29th. Royal Bank of Canada lifted their price objective on shares of F5 from $240.00 to $260.00 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a research report on Friday, January 3rd. Morgan Stanley increased their target price on shares of F5 from $262.00 to $310.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Wednesday. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group lifted their price target on shares of F5 from $212.00 to $241.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Tuesday, October 29th. Seven analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, one has assigned a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $286.38.

F5 Stock Up 7.9 %

Shares of FFIV stock traded up $21.31 on Wednesday, hitting $291.03. The stock had a trading volume of 677,850 shares, compared to its average volume of 537,421. F5 has a one year low of $159.01 and a one year high of $308.00. The business has a 50 day moving average price of $256.94 and a 200 day moving average price of $226.03. The company has a market cap of $17.06 billion, a PE ratio of 30.50, a P/E/G ratio of 3.68 and a beta of 1.06.

F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Monday, October 28th. The network technology company reported $3.67 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.45 by $0.22. The company had revenue of $747.00 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $730.43 million. F5 had a net margin of 20.13% and a return on equity of 20.80%. F5’s revenue was up 5.7% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the company posted $2.76 earnings per share. Equities research analysts expect that F5 will post 11.01 EPS for the current year.

F5 declared that its board has initiated a stock repurchase plan on Monday, October 28th that permits the company to repurchase $1.00 billion in outstanding shares. This repurchase authorization permits the network technology company to purchase up to 7.9% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase plans are often an indication that the company’s board of directors believes its shares are undervalued.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, Director Alan Higginson sold 825 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, November 19th. The shares were sold at an average price of $239.77, for a total transaction of $197,810.25. Following the completion of the transaction, the director now directly owns 9,882 shares in the company, valued at $2,369,407.14. The trade was a 7.71 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. 0.58% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On F5

A number of institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of FFIV. Northwest Investment Counselors LLC purchased a new stake in shares of F5 during the 3rd quarter worth about $28,000. Kathleen S. Wright Associates Inc. acquired a new position in F5 in the 3rd quarter worth about $32,000. Friedenthal Financial purchased a new position in F5 during the fourth quarter worth approximately $50,000. Brown Financial Advisors acquired a new stake in F5 in the second quarter valued at approximately $66,000. Finally, Venturi Wealth Management LLC increased its position in shares of F5 by 79.8% in the third quarter. Venturi Wealth Management LLC now owns 320 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $70,000 after buying an additional 142 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 90.66% of the company’s stock.

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.