Applied Finance Capital Management LLC Buys New Stake in F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV)

Key Points

• Applied Finance Capital Management LLC has taken a position in F5, Inc. by purchasing 1,438 shares valued at approximately $383,000 in the first quarter.
• Director Elizabeth Buse sold 1,500 shares of F5's stock, resulting in a 23.03% decrease in her position, while insider sales totaled 8,519 shares worth over $2.4 million in the last quarter.
• Analysts have mixed views on F5, with one sell, seven hold, and three buy ratings; the consensus target price is currently $291.44.

Applied Finance Capital Management LLC bought a new position in F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV - Free Report) in the 1st quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The institutional investor bought 1,438 shares of the network technology company's stock, valued at approximately $383,000.

Several other hedge funds also recently bought and sold shares of the company. GAMMA Investing LLC raised its position in shares of F5 by 34,698.9% during the 1st quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 746,089 shares of the network technology company's stock valued at $198,661,000 after buying an additional 743,945 shares in the last quarter. Norges Bank acquired a new stake in F5 in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $171,127,000. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership lifted its stake in shares of F5 by 598.3% during the fourth quarter. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership now owns 425,275 shares of the network technology company's stock worth $106,944,000 after buying an additional 364,372 shares during the period. Robeco Institutional Asset Management B.V. lifted its stake in shares of F5 by 110.4% during the first quarter. Robeco Institutional Asset Management B.V. now owns 560,493 shares of the network technology company's stock worth $149,242,000 after buying an additional 294,050 shares during the period. Finally, Pacer Advisors Inc. lifted its stake in shares of F5 by 659.3% during the first quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. now owns 316,992 shares of the network technology company's stock worth $84,405,000 after buying an additional 275,244 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 90.66% of the company's stock.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, Director Michael L. Dreyer sold 1,800 shares of the firm's stock in a transaction on Tuesday, May 27th. The shares were sold at an average price of $285.96, for a total value of $514,728.00. Following the sale, the director directly owned 4,376 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,251,360.96. This trade represents a 29.15% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. Also, CEO Francois Locoh-Donou sold 1,300 shares of the firm's stock in a transaction on Tuesday, July 1st. The shares were sold at an average price of $294.32, for a total transaction of $382,616.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer owned 107,100 shares in the company, valued at $31,521,672. The trade was a 1.20% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last three months, insiders sold 8,519 shares of company stock worth $2,408,594. 0.52% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several equities research analysts have recently commented on FFIV shares. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted their price objective on shares of F5 from $285.00 to $305.00 and gave the stock a "neutral" rating in a research note on Thursday, July 17th. Wolfe Research assumed coverage on shares of F5 in a research report on Monday, July 7th. They set an "outperform" rating for the company. Wall Street Zen downgraded shares of F5 from a "strong-buy" rating to a "buy" rating in a research report on Thursday, May 22nd. Morgan Stanley boosted their target price on shares of F5 from $280.00 to $305.00 and gave the company an "equal weight" rating in a research report on Friday, July 18th. Finally, Royal Bank Of Canada reaffirmed a "sector perform" rating and issued a $290.00 price objective on shares of F5 in a report on Tuesday, April 29th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, seven have assigned a hold rating and three have given a buy rating to the company's stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has an average rating of "Hold" and an average price target of $291.44.

F5 Price Performance

Shares of FFIV stock traded down $0.80 during trading hours on Wednesday, hitting $298.44. The company had a trading volume of 162,855 shares, compared to its average volume of 534,491. The company's fifty day moving average is $293.19 and its 200 day moving average is $281.54. F5, Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $184.80 and a fifty-two week high of $313.00. The stock has a market capitalization of $17.14 billion, a PE ratio of 28.30, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.81 and a beta of 1.00.

F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV - Get Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Monday, April 28th. The network technology company reported $3.42 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.11 by $0.31. The firm had revenue of $590.16 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $719.91 million. F5 had a net margin of 21.14% and a return on equity of 21.18%. The business's revenue for the quarter was up 7.3% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the business posted $2.91 EPS. Equities analysts forecast that F5, Inc. will post 11.2 earnings per share for the current year.

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.