Columbus Macro LLC Purchases 883 Shares of Fortinet, Inc. (NASDAQ:FTNT)

Columbus Macro LLC grew its position in Fortinet, Inc. (NASDAQ:FTNT) by 29.2% in the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The institutional investor owned 3,908 shares of the software maker’s stock after acquiring an additional 883 shares during the period. Columbus Macro LLC’s holdings in Fortinet were worth $369,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other large investors have also made changes to their positions in FTNT. First Hawaiian Bank acquired a new position in Fortinet in the fourth quarter valued at about $670,000. LVM Capital Management Ltd. MI grew its position in shares of Fortinet by 10.7% in the 4th quarter. LVM Capital Management Ltd. MI now owns 89,827 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $8,487,000 after purchasing an additional 8,707 shares during the period. Apollon Wealth Management LLC increased its stake in Fortinet by 7.6% during the 3rd quarter. Apollon Wealth Management LLC now owns 15,296 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $1,186,000 after purchasing an additional 1,081 shares in the last quarter. Forsta AP Fonden raised its holdings in Fortinet by 11.8% during the 3rd quarter. Forsta AP Fonden now owns 135,500 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $10,508,000 after buying an additional 14,300 shares during the period. Finally, Quadrature Capital Ltd bought a new position in Fortinet in the third quarter valued at approximately $10,343,000. Institutional investors own 83.71% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities research analysts recently commented on FTNT shares. Baird R W lowered shares of Fortinet from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Monday. Needham & Company LLC reissued a “hold” rating on shares of Fortinet in a research note on Friday, November 22nd. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft upped their price objective on Fortinet from $77.00 to $90.00 and gave the stock a “hold” rating in a research report on Tuesday, November 19th. StockNews.com raised Fortinet from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, October 25th. Finally, Citigroup upped their price target on Fortinet from $100.00 to $101.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday, January 17th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, nineteen have assigned a hold rating, thirteen have assigned a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, Fortinet currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $97.73.

Insider Transactions at Fortinet

In related news, CFO Keith Jensen sold 4,250 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, November 19th. The shares were sold at an average price of $90.83, for a total transaction of $386,027.50. Following the completion of the sale, the chief financial officer now owns 4,689 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $425,901.87. This represents a 47.54 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. Also, Director William H. Neukom bought 355 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Friday, December 6th. The stock was purchased at an average cost of $98.50 per share, for a total transaction of $34,967.50. Following the completion of the acquisition, the director now owns 150,245 shares in the company, valued at approximately $14,799,132.50. This trade represents a 0.24 % increase in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this purchase can be found here. Over the last ninety days, insiders have sold 67,860 shares of company stock valued at $6,469,056. 18.00% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Fortinet Stock Performance

Shares of NASDAQ FTNT opened at $102.78 on Wednesday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.09, a current ratio of 1.34 and a quick ratio of 1.25. The firm has a market cap of $78.78 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 51.91, a P/E/G ratio of 2.65 and a beta of 1.01. The stock’s fifty day moving average price is $96.70 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $83.92. Fortinet, Inc. has a one year low of $54.57 and a one year high of $102.87.

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, November 7th. The software maker reported $0.56 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.43 by $0.13. Fortinet had a net margin of 26.79% and a return on equity of 973.30%. The business had revenue of $1.51 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.48 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the company posted $0.35 earnings per share. On average, equities analysts forecast that Fortinet, Inc. will post 1.95 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.