F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) Stock Price Expected to Rise, Barclays Analyst Says

F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) had its price target boosted by Barclays from $246.00 to $296.00 in a note issued to investors on Wednesday,Benzinga reports. The brokerage presently has an “equal weight” rating on the network technology company’s stock. Barclays‘s price target points to a potential downside of 1.82% from the company’s previous close.

Other research analysts have also issued reports about the company. Royal Bank of Canada upped their price target on F5 from $240.00 to $260.00 and gave the company a “sector perform” rating in a research report on Friday, January 3rd. The Goldman Sachs Group increased their price target on shares of F5 from $212.00 to $241.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Tuesday, October 29th. Morgan Stanley boosted their price objective on shares of F5 from $262.00 to $310.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Wednesday. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased their target price on shares of F5 from $225.00 to $250.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Tuesday, October 29th. Finally, Evercore ISI boosted their price target on shares of F5 from $240.00 to $270.00 and gave the company an “in-line” rating in a report on Friday, January 17th. Seven research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, one has given a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, F5 presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $299.38.

F5 Price Performance

FFIV stock opened at $301.48 on Wednesday. The firm has a market cap of $17.49 billion, a PE ratio of 31.54, a P/E/G ratio of 3.68 and a beta of 1.06. F5 has a 12 month low of $159.01 and a 12 month high of $308.00. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of $259.25 and a 200 day simple moving average of $227.07.

F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Monday, October 28th. The network technology company reported $3.67 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.45 by $0.22. The firm had revenue of $747.00 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $730.43 million. F5 had a return on equity of 20.80% and a net margin of 20.13%. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 5.7% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company earned $2.76 EPS. As a group, sell-side analysts expect that F5 will post 11.01 earnings per share for the current year.

F5 declared that its Board of Directors has authorized a share buyback program on Monday, October 28th that authorizes the company to repurchase $1.00 billion in shares. This repurchase authorization authorizes the network technology company to repurchase up to 7.9% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase programs are usually an indication that the company’s management believes its stock is undervalued.

Insider Buying and Selling

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

Hedge Funds Weigh In On F5

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the company. Hotchkis & Wiley Capital Management LLC increased its holdings in shares of F5 by 3.6% in the third quarter. Hotchkis & Wiley Capital Management LLC now owns 5,489,388 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $1,208,763,000 after acquiring an additional 191,020 shares in the last quarter. State Street Corp increased its stake in F5 by 0.5% during the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 3,187,222 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $701,825,000 after purchasing an additional 16,663 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC increased its stake in F5 by 8.0% during the 3rd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 1,573,995 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $345,560,000 after purchasing an additional 117,080 shares in the last quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised its holdings in F5 by 24.7% during the 3rd quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 409,130 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $90,090,000 after buying an additional 81,005 shares during the period. Finally, Retirement Systems of Alabama lifted its stake in F5 by 7.7% in the third quarter. Retirement Systems of Alabama now owns 377,387 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $83,101,000 after buying an additional 27,124 shares in the last quarter. 90.66% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

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.