Zscaler (NASDAQ:ZS) Shares Down 4.1% – Should You Sell?

Zscaler, Inc. (NASDAQ:ZS)’s stock price was down 4.1% during trading on Tuesday . The company traded as low as $169.71 and last traded at $168.7710. 711,371 shares changed hands during mid-day trading, a decline of 79% from the average daily volume of 3,339,190 shares. The stock had previously closed at $176.06.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several research firms have recently weighed in on ZS. Stifel Nicolaus increased their price objective on Zscaler from $175.00 to $200.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, August 19th. Canaccord Genuity Group restated a “buy” rating and issued a $210.00 price target on shares of Zscaler in a research report on Thursday, June 11th. Berenberg Bank set a $200.00 price target on Zscaler in a report on Thursday, May 28th. Stephens restated an “overweight” rating and set a $200.00 target price on shares of Zscaler in a research report on Friday, June 12th. Finally, Sanford C. Bernstein dropped their price target on shares of Zscaler from $228.00 to $224.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, May 27th. Thirty-four research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, six have issued a Hold rating and one has issued a Sell rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Zscaler has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $215.92.

Zscaler Stock Performance

The stock has a 50-day moving average of $152.01 and a 200-day moving average of $150.11. The firm has a market cap of $27.19 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of -350.29, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 106.97 and a beta of 0.94. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.72, a quick ratio of 1.86 and a current ratio of 1.86.

Zscaler (NASDAQ:ZS) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, May 26th. The company reported $1.08 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.01 by $0.07. Zscaler had a negative return on equity of 0.37% and a negative net margin of 2.44%.The company had revenue of $850.48 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $835.14 million. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm posted $0.84 EPS. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 25.4% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, analysts anticipate that Zscaler, Inc. will post 0.13 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling at Zscaler

In other news, CFO Kevin Rubin sold 503 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, July 27th. The stock was sold at an average price of $147.12, for a total value of $74,001.36. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer directly owned 41,398 shares in the company, valued at approximately $6,090,473.76. This represents a 1.20% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, CEO Jagtar Singh Chaudhry sold 2,878 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, June 16th. The shares were sold at an average price of $126.43, for a total transaction of $363,865.54. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer directly owned 343,038 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $43,370,294.34. The trade was a 0.83% decrease in their position. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. The sale was made to cover tax withholding obligations related to the vesting of equity awards. Insiders have sold 16,269 shares of company stock worth $2,052,589 over the last quarter. Company insiders own 17.20% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Handelsbanken Fonder AB grew its holdings in Zscaler by 89.6% during the 2nd quarter. Handelsbanken Fonder AB now owns 60,933 shares of the company’s stock valued at $8,601,000 after buying an additional 28,792 shares in the last quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. boosted its position in Zscaler by 6.6% during the second quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 193,297 shares of the company’s stock valued at $27,284,000 after buying an additional 11,941 shares during the period. Oxbow Advisors LLC bought a new position in Zscaler during the 4th quarter worth approximately $2,939,000. Qsemble Capital Management LP raised its holdings in Zscaler by 105.5% during the 4th quarter. Qsemble Capital Management LP now owns 15,773 shares of the company’s stock valued at $3,548,000 after buying an additional 8,099 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Bank of America Corp DE grew its position in shares of Zscaler by 44.3% in the 1st quarter. Bank of America Corp DE now owns 779,245 shares of the company’s stock worth $109,320,000 after buying an additional 239,326 shares during the last quarter. 46.45% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

About Zscaler

Zscaler is a cloud security company that delivers a cloud-native platform to protect users, applications and data as organizations move away from traditional, network-centric security architectures. The company focuses on a zero trust approach that assumes no implicit trust for users or devices, providing secure access to the internet, SaaS applications and private applications regardless of where users are located. Zscaler positions its services as an alternative to legacy appliances and site-centric VPNs, aiming to simplify security while enabling modern, distributed workforces.

Key offerings are built around the Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange, a multi-tenant cloud platform that enforces security and access policies in-line.