First Trust Advisors LP Acquires 76,164 Shares of Snowflake Inc. $SNOW

Key Points

• First Trust Advisors LP boosted its Snowflake stake by 5.8% in Q3, buying 76,164 shares to hold 1,388,689 shares worth about $313.2 million, and institutional ownership remains high (hedge funds own ~65.1%).
• Snowflake’s upbeat FY2026 results, double‑digit product revenue growth and expanding AI positioning (partnerships with OpenAI/Anthropic and acquisitions) have driven positive analyst sentiment and buying interest.
• Countering the momentum, multiple class‑action filings have created a legal cloud that raises short‑term headline risk, while insiders have sold sizable stakes recently (662,940 shares, ~$135.7M over three months).

First Trust Advisors LP boosted its holdings in Snowflake Inc. (NYSE:SNOW - Free Report) by 5.8% in the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The fund owned 1,388,689 shares of the company's stock after buying an additional 76,164 shares during the quarter. First Trust Advisors LP owned 0.41% of Snowflake worth $313,219,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Norges Bank purchased a new position in shares of Snowflake during the second quarter valued at approximately $944,895,000. Winslow Capital Management LLC bought a new position in Snowflake during the second quarter valued at approximately $725,667,000. American Century Companies Inc. boosted its holdings in Snowflake by 233.3% in the third quarter. American Century Companies Inc. now owns 2,104,925 shares of the company's stock worth $474,766,000 after purchasing an additional 1,473,354 shares during the last quarter. Sei Investments Co. grew its position in Snowflake by 272.4% in the 2nd quarter. Sei Investments Co. now owns 1,593,329 shares of the company's stock worth $356,543,000 after purchasing an additional 1,165,515 shares during the period. Finally, Jennison Associates LLC grew its position in Snowflake by 13.5% in the 3rd quarter. Jennison Associates LLC now owns 9,083,889 shares of the company's stock worth $2,048,871,000 after purchasing an additional 1,083,222 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 65.10% of the company's stock.

Snowflake News Summary

Here are the key news stories impacting Snowflake this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Strong post‑earnings / AI momentum: Market commentary points to follow‑through from Snowflake’s upbeat FY2026 results, double‑digit product revenue growth and expanding AI positioning (OpenAI/Anthropic partnerships, Cortex Code, Observe acquisition) as primary drivers of buying interest. QuiverQuant analysis
• Positive Sentiment: Anthropic marketplace mention: Anthropic’s new marketplace will surface third‑party tools that include Snowflake integrations — a distribution channel that could increase enterprise consumption of Snowflake services. Yahoo / Anthropic
• Neutral Sentiment: Analyst landscape and technicals: Recent analyst coverage remains largely constructive (multiple buy/overweight ratings and mid‑$200 median price target) which supports longer‑term conviction, while technical factors and short‑covering may amplify moves. QuiverQuant (ratings & targets)
• Neutral Sentiment: Minor analyst upgrade: Zacks moved SNOW from "strong sell" to "hold" — a modest sentiment improvement but not a full analyst endorsement. Zacks upgrade
• Negative Sentiment: Multiple securities class‑action notices filed/announced: Several plaintiff firms (Gross, Schall, Rosen, Pomerantz, Faruqi, Portnoy, Bernstein Liebhard, DJS and others) have issued investor alerts and filed complaints alleging disclosures relating to product efficiency/pricing and revenue — lead plaintiff deadlines around April 27, 2026. This legal cloud increases short‑term uncertainty and headline risk. Gross Law Firm
• Negative Sentiment: Broader wave of plaintiff outreach: Multiple other firms (Schall, Rosen, Pomerantz, Faruqi, Portnoy, Bernstein Liebhard, etc.) posted similar notices the same week, magnifying reputational/legal risk and potential future settlement/defense costs. Schall Law Firm

Insider Activity

In related news, SVP Vivek Raghunathan sold 11,801 shares of Snowflake stock in a transaction on Wednesday, December 31st. The shares were sold at an average price of $220.44, for a total transaction of $2,601,412.44. Following the transaction, the senior vice president owned 218,020 shares in the company, valued at approximately $48,060,328.80. The trade was a 5.13% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. Also, Director Frank Slootman sold 200,000 shares of the company's stock in a transaction on Thursday, December 18th. The stock was sold at an average price of $221.83, for a total transaction of $44,366,000.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director directly owned 50,329 shares of the company's stock, valued at $11,164,482.07. This represents a 79.89% decrease in their position. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. In the last three months, insiders have sold 662,940 shares of company stock valued at $135,715,906. Company insiders own 6.80% of the company's stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several equities analysts have recently weighed in on SNOW shares. Raymond James Financial reissued an "outperform" rating on shares of Snowflake in a report on Monday, February 2nd. Needham & Company LLC reduced their price objective on Snowflake from $280.00 to $200.00 and set a "buy" rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, February 26th. Argus raised Snowflake from a "hold" rating to a "buy" rating and set a $300.00 target price on the stock in a report on Thursday, January 8th. Barclays dropped their target price on Snowflake from $204.00 to $192.00 and set an "equal weight" rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, February 26th. Finally, Truist Financial cut their price target on Snowflake from $270.00 to $240.00 and set a "buy" rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, February 26th. Two analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, thirty-three have given a Buy rating, five have given a Hold rating and two have given a Sell rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, Snowflake currently has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average price target of $248.58.

Snowflake Stock Up 1.6%

NYSE SNOW opened at $180.33 on Friday. The stock's 50-day moving average price is $193.81 and its 200-day moving average price is $221.74. The company has a quick ratio of 1.37, a current ratio of 1.37 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.07. Snowflake Inc. has a 52 week low of $120.10 and a 52 week high of $280.67. The company has a market capitalization of $61.71 billion, a P/E ratio of -45.65 and a beta of 1.16.

Snowflake (NYSE:SNOW - Get Free Report) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, February 25th. The company reported $0.32 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts' consensus estimates of $0.27 by $0.05. The company had revenue of $1.28 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.25 billion. Snowflake had a negative return on equity of 48.50% and a negative net margin of 28.43%.The firm's revenue was up 30.1% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $0.30 EPS. On average, equities research analysts predict that Snowflake Inc. will post -2.36 earnings per share for the current year.

Snowflake Company Profile

Snowflake Inc is a cloud-native data platform company that provides a suite of services for storing, processing and analyzing large volumes of data. Its core offering, often described as the Snowflake Data Cloud, combines data warehousing, data lake and data sharing capabilities in a single managed service delivered across major public cloud providers. The platform is designed to support analytics, data engineering, data science and application workloads with a focus on scalability, concurrency and simplified administration.

Key products and capabilities include a multi-cluster, shared-data architecture that separates compute from storage; continuous data ingestion and streaming; support for structured and semi-structured data formats; tools for data governance, security and compliance; and developer frameworks for building data applications.

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