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

F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) released its quarterly earnings data on Monday. The network technology company reported $2.91 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.88 by $0.03, RTT News reports. F5 had a return on equity of 21.72% and a net margin of 17.91%. The firm had revenue of $681.00 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $685.47 million. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted $1.70 earnings per share. The firm’s quarterly revenue was down 3.1% on a year-over-year basis.

F5 Trading Down 9.2 %

Shares of NASDAQ FFIV opened at $165.31 on Wednesday. The stock has a market cap of $9.72 billion, a P/E ratio of 19.80, a PEG ratio of 2.68 and a beta of 1.11. F5 has a 12-month low of $129.93 and a 12-month high of $199.49. The business’s fifty day simple moving average is $187.66 and its 200-day simple moving average is $176.72.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of research firms recently commented on FFIV. Evercore ISI decreased their price objective on F5 from $200.00 to $180.00 and set an “in-line” rating on the stock in a report on Tuesday. Needham & Company LLC reiterated a “buy” rating and issued a $220.00 price objective on shares of F5 in a report on Tuesday. Barclays decreased their price target on F5 from $206.00 to $189.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a research note on Tuesday. KeyCorp upped their price target on F5 from $186.00 to $204.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 18th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. upped their price target on F5 from $197.00 to $205.00 and gave the stock 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 assigned a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $185.10.

Insider Activity

In related news, CFO Francis J. Pelzer sold 500 shares of the stock in a transaction on Tuesday, February 20th. The stock was sold at an average price of $182.31, for a total value of $91,155.00. Following the transaction, the chief financial officer now owns 32,290 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $5,886,789.90. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this link. In related news, CEO Francois Locoh-Donou sold 6,400 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, March 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $188.02, for a total value of $1,203,328.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 123,251 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $23,173,653.02. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this link. Also, CFO Francis J. Pelzer sold 500 shares of the stock in a transaction on Tuesday, February 20th. The shares were sold at an average price of $182.31, for a total value of $91,155.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer now directly owns 32,290 shares in the company, valued at approximately $5,886,789.90. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last three months, insiders have sold 10,201 shares of company stock worth $1,908,065. Corporate insiders own 0.58% 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.