Lee Klarich Sells 120,768 Shares of Palo Alto Networks (NASDAQ:PANW) Stock

Palo Alto Networks, Inc. (NASDAQ:PANW) EVP Lee Klarich sold 120,768 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, January 8th. The stock was sold at an average price of $191.03, for a total transaction of $23,070,311.04. Following the sale, the executive vice president directly owned 298,887 shares in the company, valued at approximately $57,096,383.61. The trade was a 28.78% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website.

Lee Klarich also recently made the following trade(s):

• On Wednesday, December 3rd, Lee Klarich sold 120,774 shares of Palo Alto Networks stock. The shares were sold at an average price of $191.91, for a total transaction of $23,177,738.34.
• On Monday, November 3rd, Lee Klarich sold 120,774 shares of Palo Alto Networks stock. The stock was sold at an average price of $217.94, for a total transaction of $26,321,485.56.

Palo Alto Networks Price Performance

Shares of NASDAQ PANW traded down $0.14 during mid-day trading on Monday, hitting $188.88. The company had a trading volume of 4,277,980 shares, compared to its average volume of 6,156,314. The company has a market capitalization of $131.65 billion, a PE ratio of 119.54, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 4.51 and a beta of 0.76. The business’s 50-day simple moving average is $193.84 and its 200 day simple moving average is $196.05. Palo Alto Networks, Inc. has a 1-year low of $144.15 and a 1-year high of $223.61.

Palo Alto Networks (NASDAQ:PANW) last released its earnings results on Thursday, November 20th. The network technology company reported $0.93 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.89 by $0.04. The firm had revenue of $2.47 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $2.46 billion. Palo Alto Networks had a return on equity of 17.05% and a net margin of 11.69%.Palo Alto Networks’s revenue for the quarter was up 15.7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $1.56 EPS. On average, analysts expect that Palo Alto Networks, Inc. will post 1.76 EPS for the current year.

Institutional Trading of Palo Alto Networks

Large investors have recently made changes to their positions in the company. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its holdings in shares of Palo Alto Networks by 2.0% in the third quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 65,269,963 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $13,290,270,000 after acquiring an additional 1,253,589 shares in the last quarter. State Street Corp raised its holdings in shares of Palo Alto Networks by 1.7% in the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 29,736,916 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $6,055,031,000 after acquiring an additional 505,924 shares during the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC grew its stake in Palo Alto Networks by 1.1% in the 2nd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 15,174,029 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $3,093,262,000 after acquiring an additional 169,055 shares during the period. Northern Trust Corp increased its stake in shares of Palo Alto Networks by 0.5% during the 3rd quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 7,528,248 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $1,532,902,000 after acquiring an additional 36,511 shares during the last quarter. Finally, First Trust Advisors LP boosted its holdings in shares of Palo Alto Networks by 11.5% in the 3rd quarter. First Trust Advisors LP now owns 5,906,963 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $1,202,776,000 after purchasing an additional 611,375 shares during the last quarter. 79.82% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of brokerages recently issued reports on PANW. Needham & Company LLC reiterated a “buy” rating and issued a $230.00 price target on shares of Palo Alto Networks in a research note on Thursday, November 20th. Wedbush restated an “outperform” rating and issued a $225.00 price objective on shares of Palo Alto Networks in a report on Thursday, November 20th. The Goldman Sachs Group reiterated a “buy” rating and set a $240.00 target price (up previously from $236.00) on shares of Palo Alto Networks in a research note on Thursday, November 20th. Northland Securities increased their target price on Palo Alto Networks from $177.00 to $190.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a report on Thursday, November 20th. Finally, Mizuho set a $220.00 price target on Palo Alto Networks in a report on Tuesday, December 16th. Thirty-one analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, eight have assigned a Hold rating and two have assigned a Sell rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $227.99.

About Palo Alto Networks

Palo Alto Networks (NASDAQ: PANW) is a cybersecurity company founded in 2005 and headquartered in Santa Clara, California. The firm develops a broad suite of security products and services designed to prevent successful cyberattacks and protect enterprise networks, clouds, and endpoints. Built around a platform strategy, its offerings target threat prevention, detection, response and governance across hybrid and multi-cloud environments.

The company’s product portfolio includes next‑generation firewalls as a core on‑premises capability, alongside cloud‑delivered security services and software for securing public and private clouds.