Fortinet, Inc. (NASDAQ:FTNT) Receives Consensus Rating of “Hold” from Brokerages

Shares of Fortinet, Inc. (NASDAQ:FTNT) have been given a consensus recommendation of “Hold” by the thirty-four research firms that are covering the company, Marketbeat reports. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell recommendation, twenty have given a hold recommendation, eleven have given a buy recommendation and two have given a strong buy recommendation to the company. The average 1-year price objective among analysts that have issued ratings on the stock in the last year is $104.80.

Several brokerages have recently issued reports on FTNT. Cantor Fitzgerald reduced their price objective on Fortinet from $115.00 to $100.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, April 24th. KeyCorp dropped their target price on Fortinet from $120.00 to $115.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, May 8th. DZ Bank raised Fortinet from a “strong sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Thursday, May 8th. Roth Capital set a $103.00 target price on Fortinet and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Tuesday, April 22nd. Finally, Stifel Nicolaus dropped their target price on Fortinet from $115.00 to $95.00 and set a “hold” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, May 8th.

Insider Buying and Selling at Fortinet

In other Fortinet news, CEO Ken Xie sold 158,488 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Friday, May 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $106.10, for a total transaction of $16,815,576.80. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 51,391,879 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $5,452,678,361.90. The trade was a 0.31% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, VP Michael Xie sold 3,546 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Friday, May 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $106.11, for a total transaction of $376,266.06. Following the sale, the vice president now directly owns 11,000,068 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,167,217,215.48. This trade represents a 0.03% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Company insiders own 17.20% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of Fortinet

Large investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. SJS Investment Consulting Inc. grew its holdings in shares of Fortinet by 703.1% during the 1st quarter. SJS Investment Consulting Inc. now owns 257 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $25,000 after acquiring an additional 225 shares in the last quarter. Saudi Central Bank purchased a new position in shares of Fortinet during the 1st quarter valued at $25,000. Edmond DE Rothschild Holding S.A. purchased a new position in shares of Fortinet during the 4th quarter valued at $27,000. Clearstead Trust LLC purchased a new position in shares of Fortinet during the 1st quarter valued at $28,000. Finally, Caitong International Asset Management Co. Ltd grew its holdings in shares of Fortinet by 2,184.6% during the 1st quarter. Caitong International Asset Management Co. Ltd now owns 297 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $29,000 after acquiring an additional 284 shares in the last quarter. 83.71% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Fortinet Stock Performance

Shares of NASDAQ FTNT opened at $101.66 on Friday. The company has a current ratio of 1.47, a quick ratio of 1.39 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.67. The stock has a 50 day simple moving average of $101.13 and a 200-day simple moving average of $100.03. The company has a market cap of $77.81 billion, a PE ratio of 44.98, a P/E/G ratio of 4.19 and a beta of 1.06. Fortinet has a 12-month low of $54.57 and a 12-month high of $114.82.

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, May 7th. The software maker reported $0.58 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.53 by $0.05. The business had revenue of $1.54 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.54 billion. Fortinet had a return on equity of 256.53% and a net margin of 29.30%. The business’s revenue was up 13.8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $0.43 earnings per share. On average, equities research analysts forecast that Fortinet will post 2.09 EPS for the current year.

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.