Barclays Issues Pessimistic Forecast for F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) Stock Price

F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) had its price target decreased by equities researchers at Barclays from $296.00 to $274.00 in a report issued on Tuesday,Benzinga reports. The brokerage currently has an “equal weight” rating on the network technology company’s stock. Barclays‘s price objective indicates a potential upside of 4.61% from the company’s current price.

A number of other analysts also recently commented on the company. Piper Sandler dropped their price objective on F5 from $304.00 to $262.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research note on Tuesday, April 8th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. reduced their target price on shares of F5 from $296.00 to $285.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, April 17th. Bank of America upped their price target on shares of F5 from $180.00 to $260.00 and gave the company an “underperform” rating in a report on Friday, January 31st. Royal Bank of Canada lifted their target price on shares of F5 from $260.00 to $310.00 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a report on Wednesday, January 29th. Finally, Needham & Company LLC reaffirmed a “buy” rating and issued a $320.00 price objective on shares of F5 in a research note on Tuesday. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, seven have given a hold rating, one has issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $284.00.

F5 Stock Down 1.2 %

FFIV opened at $261.92 on Tuesday. The business has a fifty day moving average of $268.38 and a 200 day moving average of $261.30. The stock has a market cap of $15.10 billion, a P/E ratio of 25.90, a PEG ratio of 3.85 and a beta of 1.14. F5 has a 52-week low of $159.01 and a 52-week high of $313.00.

F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Monday, April 28th. The network technology company reported $3.42 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.10 by $0.32. F5 had a return on equity of 20.98% and a net margin of 20.58%. The company had revenue of $590.16 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $719.91 million. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business earned $2.91 EPS. Equities analysts anticipate that F5 will post 11.2 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, EVP Chad Michael Whalen sold 4,093 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, February 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $290.33, for a total value of $1,188,320.69. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president now directly owns 27,264 shares in the company, valued at approximately $7,915,557.12. This represents a 13.05 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this link. Also, Director Marianne Budnik sold 728 shares of F5 stock in a transaction on Thursday, January 30th. The shares were sold at an average price of $304.45, for a total value of $221,639.60. Following the completion of the transaction, the director now owns 1,770 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $538,876.50. This trade represents a 29.14 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last 90 days, insiders sold 18,232 shares of company stock valued at $5,310,131. 0.52% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On F5

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Golden State Wealth Management LLC lifted its position in F5 by 275.0% in the first quarter. Golden State Wealth Management LLC now owns 105 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $28,000 after purchasing an additional 77 shares during the period. Park Square Financial Group LLC acquired a new position in shares of F5 during the fourth quarter worth $31,000. Crowley Wealth Management Inc. bought a new stake in F5 in the fourth quarter worth approximately $35,000. Hurley Capital LLC bought a new stake in shares of F5 in the 4th quarter worth $43,000. Finally, Friedenthal Financial purchased a new position in shares of F5 during the 4th quarter valued at $50,000. 90.66% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

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.