F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) Issues Quarterly Earnings Results, Beats Expectations By $0.03 EPS

F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) announced its quarterly earnings results on Monday. The network technology company reported $2.91 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.88 by $0.03, RTT News reports. The firm had revenue of $681.00 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $685.47 million. F5 had a return on equity of 21.41% and a net margin of 17.91%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was down 3.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the firm earned $1.70 EPS.

F5 Stock Up 0.8 %

Shares of NASDAQ:FFIV opened at $166.62 on Thursday. The company’s fifty day moving average is $187.01 and its two-hundred day moving average is $176.75. F5 has a 12-month low of $129.93 and a 12-month high of $199.49. The company has a market cap of $9.80 billion, a P/E ratio of 19.95, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.43 and a beta of 1.14.

Insider Buying and Selling at F5

In other F5 news, EVP Thomas Dean Fountain sold 851 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, February 8th. The shares were sold at an average price of $183.06, for a total transaction of $155,784.06. Following the sale, the executive vice president now directly owns 15,008 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,747,364.48. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. In other F5 news, EVP Thomas Dean Fountain sold 851 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, February 8th. The shares were sold at an average price of $183.06, for a total transaction of $155,784.06. Following the sale, the executive vice president now directly owns 15,008 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,747,364.48. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. Also, CFO Francis J. Pelzer sold 500 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, February 20th. The shares were sold at an average price of $182.31, for a total transaction of $91,155.00. Following the sale, the chief financial officer now directly owns 32,290 shares in the company, valued at $5,886,789.90. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 10,201 shares of company stock valued at $1,908,065 in the last three months. 0.58% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several analysts have recently weighed in on FFIV shares. Royal Bank of Canada lowered their target price on F5 from $204.00 to $182.00 and set a “sector perform” rating for the company in a research note on Tuesday. Piper Sandler reissued a “neutral” rating and issued a $167.00 target price (down previously from $187.00) on shares of F5 in a report on Tuesday. Needham & Company LLC reaffirmed a “buy” rating and set a $220.00 price target on shares of F5 in a report on Tuesday. Evercore ISI lowered their price objective on shares of F5 from $200.00 to $180.00 and set an “in-line” rating on the stock in a research note on Tuesday. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised their price objective on shares of F5 from $197.00 to $205.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday, April 11th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, seven have assigned a hold rating, two have issued a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, F5 currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $185.10.

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.