Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) Price Target Raised to $72.00

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) had its price target upped by stock analysts at Royal Bank of Canada from $68.00 to $72.00 in a research report issued to clients and investors on Wednesday, Benzinga reports. The firm currently has a “sector perform” rating on the software maker’s stock. Royal Bank of Canada’s target price would indicate a potential upside of 2.48% from the company’s previous close.

Other equities research analysts have also recently issued reports about the stock. Evercore ISI dropped their target price on shares of Fortinet from $72.00 to $67.00 and set an “in-line” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, May 3rd. UBS Group lifted their price target on shares of Fortinet from $69.00 to $70.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday. Wedbush reissued an “outperform” rating and set a $78.00 price target on shares of Fortinet in a research report on Wednesday. Barclays lowered their price target on shares of Fortinet from $75.00 to $70.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, July 11th. Finally, Mizuho lowered their price target on shares of Fortinet from $70.00 to $66.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, May 3rd. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, twenty-two have issued a hold rating and nine have given a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $70.36.

Fortinet Stock Performance

NASDAQ FTNT traded up $14.45 on Wednesday, hitting $70.26. The stock had a trading volume of 12,930,806 shares, compared to its average volume of 5,815,574. Fortinet has a 52-week low of $44.12 and a 52-week high of $73.91. The company has a market capitalization of $53.67 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 46.22, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.79 and a beta of 0.98. The firm has a 50-day moving average of $58.96 and a 200-day moving average of $63.62.

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, August 6th. The software maker reported $0.57 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.41 by $0.16. The firm had revenue of $1.43 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.40 billion. Fortinet had a net margin of 22.23% and a negative return on equity of 2,235.48%. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 10.9% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm earned $0.31 EPS. As a group, research analysts anticipate that Fortinet will post 1.47 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Transactions at Fortinet

In other news, CEO Ken Xie sold 24,267 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Monday, July 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $60.01, for a total value of $1,456,262.67. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 48,777,294 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,927,125,412.94. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. In related news, CEO Ken Xie sold 24,267 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Monday, July 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $60.01, for a total transaction of $1,456,262.67. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 48,777,294 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,927,125,412.94. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. Also, CFO Keith Jensen sold 18,701 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, June 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $59.68, for a total transaction of $1,116,075.68. Following the sale, the chief financial officer now directly owns 4,663 shares in the company, valued at approximately $278,287.84. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last quarter, insiders have sold 91,915 shares of company stock valued at $5,401,638. 18.00% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Fortinet

A number of hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of FTNT. Vima LLC bought a new position in Fortinet during the fourth quarter valued at $25,000. Winthrop Capital Management LLC purchased a new stake in Fortinet in the first quarter worth about $25,000. Rise Advisors LLC lifted its stake in Fortinet by 135.6% in the first quarter. Rise Advisors LLC now owns 377 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $26,000 after acquiring an additional 217 shares during the period. Creekmur Asset Management LLC purchased a new stake in Fortinet in the fourth quarter worth about $32,000. Finally, Oakworth Capital Inc. purchased a new stake in shares of Fortinet during the second quarter valued at about $33,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 83.71% of the company’s stock.

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.