NetApp (NTAP)
Forward P/E 22.82x against a peer median of 13.06x gives a ratio of 1.75x, the widest premium in this batch outside Palantir, with trailing P/E 32.04x also the peer set's highest on a like-for-like basis. The premium is not paid for by growth-adjusted value: PEG 2.13 is expensive, and while latest-quarter revenue grew a strong +29.9% YoY (PRIMARY/EDGAR), that is below the cluster median of +48.5% — NetApp is growing more slowly than its storage/hardware group while charging far more per earnings dollar. Delivered demand check: the Technology hardware & storage group's median latest-quarter revenue growth was 48.5% year over year (SEC filings) — demand rising fast, which makes NetApp's relative under-delivery against its own multiple harder to excuse. This is overvalued, not a bubble: the absolute forward multiple of 22.82x is ordinary and earnings are real and substantial.
What would change this label: Moves to FAIRLY PRICED if the forward P/E compresses below ~17x (ratio under 1.30x) at unchanged estimates, or if revenue growth accelerates above +50% YoY with PEG falling under ~1, showing the premium is earned; deepens if revenue growth slows below +10% YoY while the forward P/E holds above ~22x.
NetApp sells data-storage systems to big companies. Business is good — sales rose about 30% last quarter — but rival storage and hardware firms grew even faster and their shares are far cheaper. NetApp's shares cost about 23 times expected profits versus about 13 times for its group, so buyers are paying a premium the company's own growth does not currently justify.
Both lines start at 100 on 2020-09-01. Over the full window NetApp returned +387.53% and the S&P 500 +118.28% (price returns; dividends not reinvested). Worst peak-to-trough fall for NetApp: -43.5% (2024-07-10 to 2025-04-04). Source: Nasdaq official daily history.
What the label rests on
Forward P/E 22.82x against a peer median of 13.06x gives a ratio of 1.75x, the widest premium in this batch outside Palantir, with trailing P/E 32.04x also the peer set's highest on a like-for-like basis. The premium is not paid for by growth-adjusted value: PEG 2.13 is expensive, and while latest-quarter revenue grew a strong +29.9% YoY (PRIMARY/EDGAR), that is below the cluster median of +48.5% — NetApp is growing more slowly than its storage/hardware group while charging far more per earnings dollar. Delivered demand check: the Technology hardware & storage group's median latest-quarter revenue growth was 48.5% year over year (SEC filings) — demand rising fast, which makes NetApp's relative under-delivery against its own multiple harder to excuse. This is overvalued, not a bubble: the absolute forward multiple of 22.82x is ordinary and earnings are real and substantial. The company’s forward P/E is 22.8× against a peer median of 13.1×. Its own history: UNVERIFIED — no sourced range available. Sector demand read: Delivered demand check: the Technology hardware & storage group's median latest-quarter revenue growth was 48.5% year over year (SEC filings) — demand rising. Latest-quarter sales growth was +29.9% versus a year earlier (SEC filings).
| Company | Price (Oct 28, 2026) | Forward P/E | Trailing P/E |
|---|---|---|---|
| NetApp (NTAP) | $227.04 | 22.8× | 32.0× |
| P | $138.14 | 42.9× | 191.3× |
| HPQ | $32.85 | 11.1× | 12.5× |
| SMCI | $35.29 | 7.5× | 10.8× |
| HPE | $60.47 | 13.1× | 30.8× |
| WDC | $380.88 | 13.2× | 14.8× |
| Peer median | 13.1× |
Multiples: stockanalysis.com (SECONDARY, S&P Global data), fetched Oct 28, 2026. Peer set chosen by sector; the median is the middle value of the set. The label and its numbers were recorded in the programme’s label registry on Oct 28, 2026 and will be scored at 6 and 12 months.
Sales, profit and cash
Gross margin = gross profit divided by sales, from SEC filings.
Free cash flow = cash from operations minus spending on plant and equipment, both from the company’s SEC cash-flow statement. Gaps are quarters where that spending line is not separately tagged in the filings — shown as gaps, never estimated.
| Quarter | Sales | Gross margin | Net income | EPS (GAAP, diluted) | Free cash flow |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Q/E Jul 2026 2026-07-31 | $2.0B | 70.1% | $375M | 1.88 | $401M |
| Q/E Apr 2026 2026-04-24 | $1.9B | 70.1% | $404M | — | $900M |
| Q/E Jan 2026 2026-01-23 | $1.7B | 70.6% | $334M | 1.67 | $271M |
| Q/E Oct 2025 2025-10-24 | $1.7B | 72.0% | $305M | 1.51 | $78M |
| Q/E Jul 2025 2025-07-25 | $1.6B | 70.4% | $233M | 1.15 | $620M |
| Q/E Apr 2025 2025-04-25 | $1.7B | 68.9% | $340M | — | $640M |
| Q/E Jan 2025 2025-01-24 | $1.6B | 69.8% | $299M | 1.44 | $338M |
| Q/E Oct 2024 2024-10-25 | $1.7B | 71.0% | $299M | 1.42 | $60M |
| Q/E Jul 2024 2024-07-26 | $1.5B | 71.2% | $248M | 1.17 | $300M |
| Q/E Apr 2024 2024-04-26 | $1.7B | 70.5% | $291M | — | $567M |
| Q/E Jan 2024 2024-01-26 | $1.6B | 71.7% | $313M | 1.48 | $448M |
| Q/E Oct 2023 2023-10-27 | $1.6B | 71.1% | $233M | 1.10 | $97M |
The last twelve reported quarters. Full 24-quarter history sits in the data pack behind this page. A dash means the figure is not tagged as a standalone quarter in the company’s SEC facts (the usual case is the fourth quarter, which many companies only report inside the full-year filing) — it is missing, not zero.
Earnings: getting better or worse?
Each box is one quarter’s earnings per share (EPS). Green means EPS was higher than the same quarter a year earlier; red means lower; a dash means the figure is not tagged in the filings.
Basis: GAAP diluted EPS from SEC company facts, compared with the same quarter a year earlier.
Key facts
| Item | Value |
|---|---|
| Company (legal name in filings) | NetApp, Inc. |
| Chief executive | George Kurian (source: https://www.crn.com/news/ai/2026/netapp-ceo-george-kurian-we-are-light-years-ahead-of-everybody-else-in-cloud-ai) |
| Sector | Technology — Technology Hardware, Storage & Peripherals — enterprise data-storage systems and hybrid-cloud data services |
| Share price (Oct 28, 2026) | $227.04 |
| Market value (market cap) | $44.7B — share price times shares outstanding of 196,419,005 (SEC filings; SEC EDGAR dei EntityCommonStockSharesOutstanding (latest)) |
| Sales, last twelve months | $7.4B |
| Net income, last twelve months | $1.4B |
| Free cash flow, last twelve months | $1.6B |
| Latest reported quarter | Q/E Jul 2026 (of 24 quarters in the data pack) |
| Six-year price return vs S&P 500 | +387.53% vs +118.28% |
| Worst peak-to-trough fall | -43.5% (2024-07-10 to 2025-04-04) |
What we could not verify
- TTM GAAP diluted EPS could not be summed from company facts because at least one of the last four quarters (typically Q4) has no standalone tagged EPS; trailing P/E is therefore taken from the labelled secondary source in valuation_label.md.
- Own-history P/E range not yet compiled for this company in the Phase 1 batch run; the label rests on peer-median, growth and PEG evidence.
- Guidance record (each quarter scored against the guidance the company gave the quarter before) is not yet compiled for this company — it is a Phase 2 layer. The earnings strip below therefore uses reported EPS versus a year earlier, which is fully sourced from filings.
The IT factor — the most exciting thing the market is overlooking — is not assessed on an X-Ray page. It belongs to the Deep Dive (Phase 2), where it gets the evidence standard it needs. Leadership-era scoring (the six years split by chief executive) is likewise a Phase 2 layer; this page names the current chief executive only, from a sourced profile.
Sources
- SEC EDGAR submissions — Filing index; company legal name.
https://data.sec.gov/submissions/CIK0001002047.json - SEC EDGAR company facts — Quarterly financial spine: revenue, gross profit, net income, GAAP diluted EPS, operating cash flow, PP&E capex, buybacks, dividends, diluted shares.
https://data.sec.gov/api/xbrl/companyfacts/CIK0001002047.json - Nasdaq official daily history — Daily closes for the company; SPY (assetclass=etf) saved as raw/nasdaq_spy_raw.json over identical dates.
https://api.nasdaq.com/api/quote/NTAP/historical?assetclass=stocks - Valuation multiples and peer figures — stockanalysis.com (SECONDARY, S&P Global data), fetched Oct 28, 2026; see valuation_label.md in the data pack.
Conventions: earliest-filed value per period, as first reported; cash-flow years-to-date differenced quarter by quarter; EPS never differenced; free cash flow = operating cash flow minus plant-and-equipment spending. This page is a dated snapshot — updates are new versions, never silent edits.