Ensign Peak Advisors Inc Purchases 4,671 Shares of F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV)

Ensign Peak Advisors Inc raised its stake in shares of F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV - Free Report) by 11.4% in the fourth quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The fund owned 45,663 shares of the network technology company's stock after purchasing an additional 4,671 shares during the period. Ensign Peak Advisors Inc owned approximately 0.08% of F5 worth $11,483,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other hedge funds have also added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its stake in F5 by 0.9% during the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 7,544,256 shares of the network technology company's stock valued at $1,897,154,000 after purchasing an additional 64,261 shares during the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC lifted its position in shares of F5 by 1.9% during the 4th quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 1,604,362 shares of the network technology company's stock worth $402,536,000 after buying an additional 30,367 shares in the last quarter. First Trust Advisors LP lifted its position in shares of F5 by 3.1% during the 4th quarter. First Trust Advisors LP now owns 1,259,848 shares of the network technology company's stock worth $316,814,000 after buying an additional 37,354 shares in the last quarter. Northern Trust Corp lifted its position in shares of F5 by 38.0% during the 4th quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 913,021 shares of the network technology company's stock worth $229,597,000 after buying an additional 251,534 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Norges Bank bought a new position in shares of F5 during the 4th quarter worth approximately $171,127,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 90.66% of the company's stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several research firms have commented on FFIV. Morgan Stanley lifted their target price on shares of F5 from $269.00 to $280.00 and gave the stock an "equal weight" rating in a research report on Tuesday, April 29th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. dropped their price objective on F5 from $296.00 to $285.00 and set a "neutral" rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, April 17th. Barclays dropped their price objective on F5 from $296.00 to $274.00 and set an "equal weight" rating on the stock in a research note on Tuesday, April 29th. Needham & Company LLC reiterated a "buy" rating and issued a $320.00 price objective on shares of F5 in a research note on Tuesday, April 29th. Finally, Evercore ISI upped their price objective on F5 from $240.00 to $270.00 and gave the company an "in-line" rating in a research note on Friday, January 17th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, seven have given a hold rating, one has given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of "Hold" and an average target price of $282.56.

F5 Stock Performance

FFIV stock traded up $2.25 during midday trading on Friday, reaching $284.92. 331,416 shares of the company's stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 573,521. The company has a 50-day moving average price of $264.44 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $265.60. F5, Inc. has a 52 week low of $164.45 and a 52 week high of $313.00. The firm has a market capitalization of $16.36 billion, a PE ratio of 28.32, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.85 and a beta of 1.00.

F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV - Get Free Report) last issued its earnings results on Monday, April 28th. The network technology company reported $3.42 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts' consensus estimates of $3.11 by $0.31. F5 had a net margin of 20.58% and a return on equity of 20.98%. The business had revenue of $590.16 million for the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $719.91 million. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $2.91 EPS. The business's revenue for the quarter was up 7.3% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, analysts predict that F5, Inc. will post 11.2 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other F5 news, CEO Francois Locoh-Donou sold 1,300 shares of F5 stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, April 1st. The shares were sold at an average price of $265.37, for a total transaction of $344,981.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 148,647 shares in the company, valued at $39,446,454.39. The trade was a 0.87% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, EVP Thomas Dean Fountain sold 1,347 shares of the business's stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, May 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $269.03, for a total transaction of $362,383.41. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president now directly owns 20,660 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $5,558,159.80. This represents a 6.12% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last quarter, insiders have sold 9,305 shares of company stock worth $2,561,360. Corporate insiders own 0.52% of the company's stock.

About F5

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.