NetApp Inc's stock fell by 7.88% as it hit a 20-day low, reflecting broader market weakness with the Nasdaq-100 down 1.11% and the S&P 500 down 1.13%.
Morgan Stanley downgraded NetApp's rating from Equal-weight to Underweight, reducing its price target from $117 to $89. This downgrade highlights concerns over NAND price inflation and its potential negative impact on NetApp's future performance in storage solutions, amid a broader decline in hardware budgets expected to hit a 15-year low.
The downgrade signals a challenging outlook for NetApp as enterprises anticipate only 1% growth in hardware budgets for 2026, which could lead to revenue declines for IT companies. Investors may need to reassess their positions in light of these developments.
Wall Street analysts forecast NTAP stock price to rise over the next 12 months. According to Wall Street analysts, the average 1-year price target for NTAP is 124.21 USD with a low forecast of 110.00 USD and a high forecast of 137.00 USD. However, analyst price targets are subjective and often lag stock prices, so investors should focus on the objective reasons behind analyst rating changes, which better reflect the company's fundamentals.
19 Analyst Rating
Wall Street analysts forecast NTAP stock price to rise over the next 12 months. According to Wall Street analysts, the average 1-year price target for NTAP is 124.21 USD with a low forecast of 110.00 USD and a high forecast of 137.00 USD. However, analyst price targets are subjective and often lag stock prices, so investors should focus on the objective reasons behind analyst rating changes, which better reflect the company's fundamentals.
6 Buy
13 Hold
0 Sell
Moderate Buy
Current: 99.330
Low
110.00
Averages
124.21
High
137.00
Current: 99.330
Low
110.00
Averages
124.21
High
137.00
Morgan Stanley
Erik Woodring
Equal Weight -> Underweight
downgrade
$117 -> $89
2026-01-20
Reason
Morgan Stanley
Erik Woodring
Price Target
$117 -> $89
AI Analysis
2026-01-20
downgrade
Equal Weight -> Underweight
Reason
Morgan Stanley analyst Erik Woodring downgraded NetApp to Underweight from Equal Weight with a price target of $89, down from $117. The firm's chief investment officer survey indicated the the slowest hardware budget growth in 15 years. Resellers are expecting an "elastic demand response" to input cost inflation, which warrants a more defensive IT hardware position despite secular AI tailwinds, the analyst tells investors in a research note. Morgan Stanley has turned "more defensive," saying its recent survey work "signals the perfect storm of cautionary factors emerging."
Northland
Market Perform -> Outperform
upgrade
$120 -> $137
2025-11-26
Reason
Northland
Price Target
$120 -> $137
2025-11-26
upgrade
Market Perform -> Outperform
Reason
Northland upgraded NetApp to Outperform from Market Perform with a price target of $137, up from $120.
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UBS
David Vogt
Neutral
maintain
$114 -> $120
2025-11-26
Reason
UBS
David Vogt
Price Target
$114 -> $120
2025-11-26
maintain
Neutral
Reason
UBS analyst David Vogt raised the firm's price target on NetApp to $120 from $114 and keeps a Neutral rating on the shares. Margins were the stand-out in the quarter while the demand backdrop was in-line with expectations, the analyst tells investors in a research note.
Northland
Market Perform -> Outperform
upgrade
$120 -> $137
2025-11-26
Reason
Northland
Price Target
$120 -> $137
2025-11-26
upgrade
Market Perform -> Outperform
Reason
As previously reported, Northland upgraded NetApp to Outperform from Market Perform with a price target of $137, up from $120, after the company reported revenue growth excluding divested Spot accelerated to 4% year-over-year in fiscal Q2 and guided to accelerate to 5% in the second half of FY26. The firm sees incremental evidence that higher growth rates for Public Cloud Services and All Flash are incremental, not cannibalistic to hybrid, driving its raised revenue growth rates, the analyst tells investors.
About NTAP
NetApp, Inc. is an intelligent data infrastructure company combining unified data storage, integrated data, operational and workload services. It creates silo-free infrastructure, harnessing observability and AI to enable data management. Its operational and workload services provide continuous optimization of performance and efficiency for infrastructure and workloads through observability and AI. Its Hybrid Cloud segment provides a unified data storage portfolio of storage management and infrastructure solutions that helps customers modernize their data centers. Hybrid Cloud includes software, hardware, and related support, along with professional and other services. Its Public Cloud segment offers a portfolio of products delivered primarily as-a-service, including related support. This portfolio includes cloud storage, data services and operational services. These solutions and services are available in the public clouds, including Amazon AWS, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud.
About the author
Emily J. Thompson
Emily J. Thompson, a Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) with 12 years in investment research, graduated with honors from the Wharton School. Specializing in industrial and technology stocks, she provides in-depth analysis for Intellectia’s earnings and market brief reports.
