Norges Bank Invests $491.93 Million in Fortive Corporation $FTV

Norges Bank purchased a new position in Fortive Corporation (NYSE:FTV) during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The fund purchased 8,910,119 shares of the technology company’s stock, valued at approximately $491,928,000.

A number of other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in FTV. Brighton Jones LLC boosted its position in Fortive by 97.1% during the fourth quarter. Brighton Jones LLC now owns 5,706 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $428,000 after acquiring an additional 2,811 shares during the last quarter. Empowered Funds LLC boosted its position in Fortive by 6.9% during the first quarter. Empowered Funds LLC now owns 6,619 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $484,000 after acquiring an additional 430 shares during the last quarter. Geneos Wealth Management Inc. boosted its position in Fortive by 246.2% during the first quarter. Geneos Wealth Management Inc. now owns 502 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $37,000 after acquiring an additional 357 shares during the last quarter. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC boosted its position in Fortive by 87.9% during the second quarter. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 2,270 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $118,000 after acquiring an additional 1,062 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Cerity Partners LLC boosted its position in Fortive by 3.3% during the second quarter. Cerity Partners LLC now owns 80,595 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $4,201,000 after acquiring an additional 2,548 shares during the last quarter. 94.94% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Insider Activity at Fortive

In other news, SVP Peter C. Underwood sold 47,557 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Monday, May 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $60.81, for a total value of $2,891,941.17. Following the transaction, the senior vice president owned 87,780 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $5,337,901.80. This represents a 35.14% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. 0.65% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of research firms recently weighed in on FTV. Argus upgraded shares of Fortive from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $68.00 price target on the stock in a research report on Monday, May 11th. Weiss Ratings reissued a “hold (c)” rating on shares of Fortive in a research note on Friday, May 22nd. Truist Financial reissued a “hold” rating and set a $61.00 price objective (up from $56.00) on shares of Fortive in a research note on Monday, May 4th. Zacks Research lowered Fortive from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Tuesday, April 21st. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company boosted their price objective on Fortive from $58.00 to $65.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Monday, May 4th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, eleven have assigned a Hold rating and two have assigned a Sell rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $61.54.

Fortive Stock Performance

NYSE:FTV opened at $58.19 on Monday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.43, a current ratio of 0.71 and a quick ratio of 0.57. The firm has a market capitalization of $17.74 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 34.84, a PEG ratio of 3.13 and a beta of 1.06. The company’s 50-day moving average is $58.68 and its two-hundred day moving average is $56.44. Fortive Corporation has a 1-year low of $46.34 and a 1-year high of $73.77.

Fortive (NYSE:FTV) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, April 30th. The technology company reported $0.70 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.64 by $0.06. The company had revenue of $2.14 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.04 billion. Fortive had a net margin of 12.84% and a return on equity of 12.66%. Fortive’s revenue was up 7.7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $0.85 EPS. Fortive has set its FY 2026 guidance at 2.900-3.000 EPS. Analysts forecast that Fortive Corporation will post 2.96 EPS for the current year.

Fortive declared that its Board of Directors has approved a stock buyback plan on Monday, May 4th that allows the company to repurchase 20,000,000 outstanding shares. This repurchase authorization allows the technology company to buy shares of its stock through open market purchases. Shares repurchase plans are generally an indication that the company’s leadership believes its stock is undervalued.

Fortive Company Profile

Fortive Corporation (NYSE: FTV) is a diversified industrial technology company headquartered in Everett, Washington. The company was created through a spin‑off from Danaher Corporation in 2016 and has since focused on building a portfolio of professional instrumentation and industrial technology businesses. In 2020 Fortive completed a further portfolio separation with the spin‑off of Vontier, concentrating Fortive’s activities on higher‑margin instrumentation, software and services.

Fortive’s operations center on professional test and measurement, sensing and monitoring, software‑enabled solutions, and lifecycle services that support industrial and commercial customers.