Why Not F5? Outperform

Research evidence excerpt

Why Not F5? Outperform

Telecom and Networking Equipment

Communications Technology - Market Overweight

F5, INC. (FFIV) June 2, 2026

Why Not F5? Outperform Rating:

Outperform

The Wolfe Byte Price: $395.62

We think the Street underappreciates F5’s opportunity to grow the business as Price Target:

AI-based use cases emerge – last week’s Analyst Day reinforced our view. The I- $490

Series refresh will also drive nice upside. We think 18.6x 2028 EPS is too cheap Prior: $375

% Upside:

for this. Reiterate Outperform. 23.9%

View FFIV Model

Why Not F5? F5’s Analyst Day in NYC offered a great chance to get caught up View Comp Table

with the company and dig deeper into their AI opportunity – which we think most Company Information

investors underappreciate. Many (or most) of the conversations we’ve been having 52-Week Range $224 - $397

with investors have centered on the I-Series refresh. Moreover, their AI opportunity Market Cap. (MM) $22,321

Enterprise Value (MM) $21,485

is confusing – it stretches across a myriad of products (new and existing) and Shares Out. (MM) 56.4

consumption models. Also, their portfolio can benefit from the emergence of AI in Avg. Value Traded (MM) $637.91

both direct and indirect ways. Adj. Debt to Cap 0.0% SI% of Float 2.6%

Indirect Demand – The Core Business Benefits from AI… Existing customers will FCF Yield 4.1% EV/ EBITDA 19.0x

have more attack surfaces (apps, APIs, Agentic AIs, data, etc.) that can be exploited. Price to Earnings 24x

Network traffic will increase – which drives a corresponding need for higher capacity

hardware and software. The company’s core capabilities in load balancing, WAF, API/ 450

Bot protection, and DDOS mitigation are key tools here. Of course, AI deployment in 400