NetApp Gains on Beat-and-Raise Report; Analysts Remain Bullish

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NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) shares are trading over 8% higher in premarket Thursday after the computer hardware company reported first-quarter results ahead of expectations.

NetApp reported an adjusted FQ1 EPS of $1.20 on revenue of $1.59 billion, which is better than the consensus of $1.10 on sales of $1.55 billion.

For the second quarter, the company expects to record an adjusted EPS of $1.33 on revenue of $1.675 billion, which is at the midpoint of the forecasted outlook. This compares to the consensus of EPS of $1.32 on sales of $1.66 billion.

“We delivered a great start to the year, fueled by broad-based demand across our portfolio and geographies, setting all-time Q1 company highs for billings, revenue, gross profit dollars, operating income and EPS,” said CEO George Kurian.

A Stifel analyst saw good results albeit “ongoing FX, supply headwinds.”

“The results benefited from a bounce-back in NTAP’s Public Cloud segment following a hiccup last quarter,” the analyst added in a note.

A Raymond James analyst raised the price target to $105 from $94 after a beat-and-raise quarter.

“Ongoing supply chain challenges restrain the product gross margin, but expected improvement combined with prior price hikes and favorable memory costs provide offsets; we think product gross margin can recovery in FY24,” the analyst writes to clients.