Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) Price Target Lowered to $85.00 at Piper Sandler

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) had its price target trimmed by Piper Sandler from $90.00 to $85.00 in a research report report published on Thursday,Benzinga reports. The firm currently has a neutral rating on the software maker’s stock.

A number of other research firms have also recently issued reports on FTNT. TD Cowen reiterated a “hold” rating and issued a $105.00 target price on shares of Fortinet in a research report on Thursday, August 7th. Wells Fargo & Company dropped their price objective on Fortinet from $110.00 to $85.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, August 7th. Erste Group Bank downgraded Fortinet from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Thursday, August 14th. Citigroup cut shares of Fortinet from a “neutral” rating to a “mixed” rating in a report on Monday, October 20th. Finally, Cantor Fitzgerald raised their price objective on shares of Fortinet from $100.00 to $110.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday, July 16th. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, seven have given a Buy rating, twenty-six have given a Hold rating and two have assigned a Sell rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $92.57.

Fortinet Trading Up 1.6%

Shares of Fortinet stock traded up $1.25 on Thursday, hitting $81.79. 7,147,823 shares of the company’s stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 5,602,864. The stock has a market capitalization of $62.67 billion, a PE ratio of 32.59, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.17 and a beta of 1.08. The firm’s 50-day moving average price is $83.16 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $93.11. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.24, a current ratio of 1.33 and a quick ratio of 1.24. Fortinet has a one year low of $70.12 and a one year high of $114.82.

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) last announced its earnings results on Wednesday, November 5th. The software maker reported $0.74 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.63 by $0.11. Fortinet had a net margin of 30.60% and a return on equity of 111.46%. The firm had revenue of $1.72 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.70 billion. During the same period last year, the company posted $0.63 EPS. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 14.4% on a year-over-year basis. Fortinet has set its FY 2025 guidance at 2.660-2.700 EPS. Q4 2025 guidance at 0.730-0.750 EPS. On average, research analysts expect that Fortinet will post 2.09 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling at Fortinet

In other Fortinet news, CEO Ken Xie sold 158,485 shares of Fortinet stock in a transaction dated Monday, November 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $86.51, for a total value of $13,710,537.35. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer directly owned 51,391,879 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $4,445,911,452.29. The trade was a 0.31% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this link. Also, VP Michael Xie sold 3,546 shares of Fortinet stock in a transaction dated Monday, November 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $86.53, for a total value of $306,835.38. Following the completion of the sale, the vice president owned 10,492,018 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $907,874,317.54. The trade was a 0.03% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. 17.20% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Fortinet

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Norges Bank bought a new position in Fortinet in the 2nd quarter worth $1,640,900,000. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its stake in Fortinet by 5.2% during the 1st quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 71,662,404 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $6,898,223,000 after purchasing an additional 3,546,934 shares during the period. AQR Capital Management LLC boosted its stake in Fortinet by 40.9% in the 1st quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 5,971,648 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $561,156,000 after purchasing an additional 1,733,670 shares during the period. Nuveen LLC purchased a new stake in Fortinet during the 1st quarter valued at approximately $153,576,000. Finally, UBS AM A Distinct Business Unit of UBS Asset Management Americas LLC raised its position in shares of Fortinet by 17.1% during the first quarter. UBS AM A Distinct Business Unit of UBS Asset Management Americas LLC now owns 7,016,467 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $675,405,000 after buying an additional 1,026,277 shares during the last quarter. 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.