Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) Price Target Cut to $66.00 by Analysts at Mizuho

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) had its target price dropped by Mizuho from $70.00 to $66.00 in a research note issued to investors on Friday, Benzinga reports. The brokerage presently has a “neutral” rating on the software maker’s stock. Mizuho’s price objective points to a potential upside of 9.98% from the stock’s current price.

FTNT has been the subject of a number of other reports. Robert W. Baird reduced their price target on shares of Fortinet from $81.00 to $75.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Friday. StockNews.com lowered shares of Fortinet from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Thursday, April 18th. Cantor Fitzgerald restated a “neutral” rating and issued a $65.00 price target on shares of Fortinet in a research note on Wednesday, April 17th. Jefferies Financial Group dropped their price objective on Fortinet from $75.00 to $70.00 and set a “hold” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, April 18th. Finally, Daiwa Capital Markets upgraded shares of Fortinet from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $75.00 price target for the company in a research report on Tuesday, February 13th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, twenty-one have assigned a hold rating and eleven have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $71.35.

Fortinet Stock Performance

Shares of NASDAQ FTNT traded down $5.19 during midday trading on Friday, hitting $60.01. 7,683,557 shares of the company’s stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 5,776,416. The firm has a fifty day moving average of $67.71 and a 200 day moving average of $61.90. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 13.38, a quick ratio of 1.06 and a current ratio of 1.19. The stock has a market capitalization of $45.81 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 41.52, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.82 and a beta of 1.08. Fortinet has a 1 year low of $44.12 and a 1 year high of $81.24.

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) last released its earnings results on Thursday, May 2nd. The software maker reported $0.43 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.38 by $0.05. The firm had revenue of $1.35 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.34 billion. Fortinet had a negative return on equity of 7,572.46% and a net margin of 21.64%. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 7.2% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm posted $0.29 earnings per share. On average, analysts forecast that Fortinet will post 1.39 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling at Fortinet

In other news, CEO Ken Xie sold 46,084 shares of Fortinet stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, February 13th. The shares were sold at an average price of $69.07, for a total value of $3,183,021.88. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 51,813,638 shares in the company, valued at $3,578,767,976.66. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. In other Fortinet news, CEO Ken Xie sold 46,084 shares of Fortinet stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, February 13th. The stock was sold at an average price of $69.07, for a total value of $3,183,021.88. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 51,813,638 shares in the company, valued at $3,578,767,976.66. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, VP Michael Xie sold 24,710 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, May 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $64.48, for a total value of $1,593,300.80. Following the completion of the sale, the vice president now owns 10,867,018 shares in the company, valued at approximately $700,705,320.64. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last 90 days, insiders sold 118,480 shares of company stock valued at $8,021,556. Corporate insiders own 17.54% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of Fortinet

Institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the business. Massmutual Trust Co. FSB ADV increased its position in Fortinet by 22.4% during the first quarter. Massmutual Trust Co. FSB ADV now owns 984 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $67,000 after acquiring an additional 180 shares during the last quarter. Buckhead Capital Management LLC grew its position in shares of Fortinet by 0.6% during the 4th quarter. Buckhead Capital Management LLC now owns 30,134 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $1,764,000 after acquiring an additional 187 shares during the period. STF Management LP lifted its position in Fortinet by 1.5% during the fourth quarter. STF Management LP now owns 12,917 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $756,000 after buying an additional 187 shares in the last quarter. First Trust Direct Indexing L.P. grew its position in Fortinet by 1.6% in the 3rd quarter. First Trust Direct Indexing L.P. now owns 12,743 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $748,000 after acquiring an additional 197 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Johnson Investment Counsel Inc. boosted its holdings in Fortinet by 1.0% in the fourth quarter. Johnson Investment Counsel Inc. now owns 20,696 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $1,211,000 after purchasing an additional 200 shares in the last quarter. 83.71% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Fortinet Company Profile

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.