Fortinet’s (FTNT) Outperform Rating Reaffirmed at Wedbush

Wedbush restated their outperform rating on shares of Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) in a report issued on Wednesday, Benzinga reports. Wedbush currently has a $78.00 price target on the software maker’s stock.

Other research analysts also recently issued research reports about the stock. Robert W. Baird dropped their price objective on shares of Fortinet from $81.00 to $75.00 and set an outperform rating for the company in a research note on Friday, May 3rd. Rosenblatt Securities reaffirmed a buy rating and set a $85.00 price target on shares of Fortinet in a research note on Friday, May 3rd. Cantor Fitzgerald decreased their price target on shares of Fortinet from $65.00 to $55.00 and set a neutral rating on the stock in a report on Friday, May 3rd. Morgan Stanley dropped their price objective on Fortinet from $81.00 to $73.00 and set an overweight rating for the company in a report on Friday, May 3rd. Finally, DZ Bank cut Fortinet from a hold rating to a sell rating and set a $60.00 target price on the stock. in a report on Thursday, February 8th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, twenty have issued a hold rating and eleven have given a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company has an average rating of Hold and an average price target of $70.10.

Fortinet Stock Performance

Shares of FTNT opened at $61.35 on Wednesday. Fortinet has a 1 year low of $44.12 and a 1 year high of $81.24. The company’s 50 day simple moving average is $64.61 and its 200 day simple moving average is $62.43. The company has a market capitalization of $46.87 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 40.10, a PEG ratio of 3.00 and a beta of 1.08. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 13.38, a quick ratio of 1.08 and a current ratio of 1.20.

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, May 2nd. The software maker reported $0.43 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.38 by $0.05. The company had revenue of $1.35 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.34 billion. Fortinet had a negative return on equity of 2,235.48% and a net margin of 22.23%. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 7.2% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company posted $0.29 EPS. On average, sell-side analysts predict that Fortinet will post 1.46 EPS for the current year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, CEO Ken Xie sold 23,992 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, April 16th. The shares were sold at an average price of $64.75, for a total value of $1,553,482.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 48,660,648 shares in the company, valued at approximately $3,150,776,958. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. In other news, VP Michael Xie sold 24,710 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, May 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $64.48, for a total transaction of $1,593,300.80. Following the completion of the transaction, the vice president now directly owns 10,867,018 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $700,705,320.64. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, CEO Ken Xie sold 23,992 shares of the stock in a transaction on Tuesday, April 16th. The stock was sold at an average price of $64.75, for a total value of $1,553,482.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 48,660,648 shares in the company, valued at $3,150,776,958. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 72,396 shares of company stock valued at $4,838,534 in the last ninety days. Corporate insiders own 18.00% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of Fortinet

Several hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the company. Duality Advisers LP acquired a new position in shares of Fortinet during the third quarter worth approximately $377,000. Private Advisor Group LLC grew its stake in shares of Fortinet by 14.5% in the third quarter. Private Advisor Group LLC now owns 21,301 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $1,250,000 after purchasing an additional 2,699 shares in the last quarter. Larson Financial Group LLC increased its holdings in shares of Fortinet by 77.3% during the third quarter. Larson Financial Group LLC now owns 3,653 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $214,000 after purchasing an additional 1,593 shares during the period. MGO One Seven LLC bought a new stake in shares of Fortinet during the third quarter valued at about $222,000. Finally, Signaturefd LLC lifted its holdings in Fortinet by 2.7% in the third quarter. Signaturefd LLC now owns 11,610 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $681,000 after purchasing an additional 300 shares during the period. 83.71% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

About Fortinet

Fortinet, Inc provides cybersecurity and convergence of networking and security solutions worldwide. It offers secure networking solutions focus on the convergence of networking and security; network firewall solutions that consist of FortiGate data centers, hyperscale, and distributed firewalls, as well as encrypted applications; wireless LAN solutions; and secure connectivity solutions, including FortiSwitch secure ethernet switches, FortiAP wireless local area network access points, FortiExtender 5G connectivity gateways, and other products.