Man Group plc Makes New Investment in Qualys, Inc. $QLYS

Man Group plc acquired a new position in shares of Qualys, Inc. (NASDAQ:QLYS) in the 2nd quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The fund acquired 11,657 shares of the software maker’s stock, valued at approximately $1,603,000.

A number of other hedge funds have also made changes to their positions in the business. NewEdge Advisors LLC raised its position in shares of Qualys by 3,948.0% during the 1st quarter. NewEdge Advisors LLC now owns 2,024 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $255,000 after acquiring an additional 1,974 shares in the last quarter. Sivia Capital Partners LLC acquired a new position in Qualys in the second quarter valued at approximately $292,000. Northwestern Mutual Wealth Management Co. boosted its holdings in Qualys by 3,218.8% in the second quarter. Northwestern Mutual Wealth Management Co. now owns 531 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $76,000 after purchasing an additional 515 shares in the last quarter. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC increased its stake in Qualys by 482.0% in the second quarter. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 646 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $92,000 after purchasing an additional 535 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Amundi increased its stake in Qualys by 47.1% in the second quarter. Amundi now owns 21,365 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $3,076,000 after purchasing an additional 6,844 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 99.31% of the company’s stock.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, insider Bruce K. Posey sold 866 shares of the stock in a transaction on Thursday, August 20th. The stock was sold at an average price of $184.23, for a total transaction of $159,543.18. Following the completion of the sale, the insider directly owned 59,554 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $10,971,633.42. This trade represents a 1.43% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, CFO Joo Mi Kim sold 1,627 shares of Qualys stock in a transaction on Monday, August 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $153.04, for a total transaction of $248,996.08. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer owned 75,743 shares in the company, valued at approximately $11,591,708.72. This trade represents a 2.10% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Insiders have sold 58,614 shares of company stock worth $7,747,968 over the last three months. 0.72% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Qualys Stock Down 3.5%

NASDAQ QLYS opened at $170.83 on Thursday. The firm has a market cap of $5.91 billion, a P/E ratio of 29.56 and a beta of 0.62. Qualys, Inc. has a 52-week low of $74.51 and a 52-week high of $201.54. The business’s 50-day moving average price is $161.85 and its 200 day moving average price is $119.42.

Qualys (NASDAQ:QLYS) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, August 4th. The software maker reported $1.98 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.78 by $0.20. Qualys had a return on equity of 37.52% and a net margin of 29.38%.The firm had revenue of $182.18 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $178.57 million. During the same period in the prior year, the business earned $1.68 EPS. The firm’s revenue was up 11.1% compared to the same quarter last year. Qualys has set its FY 2026 guidance at 7.740-7.880 EPS and its Q3 2026 guidance at 1.910-1.980 EPS. As a group, analysts anticipate that Qualys, Inc. will post 5.85 earnings per share for the current year.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several brokerages have recently weighed in on QLYS. Jefferies Financial Group boosted their price objective on shares of Qualys from $150.00 to $185.00 and gave the stock a “hold” rating in a research report on Wednesday, August 5th. Zacks Research upgraded shares of Qualys from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, August 11th. Canaccord Genuity Group set a $190.00 price target on shares of Qualys in a research report on Wednesday, August 5th. TD Cowen upped their price objective on shares of Qualys from $145.00 to $170.00 and gave the company a “hold” rating in a research note on Wednesday, August 5th. Finally, Wall Street Zen raised Qualys from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Saturday, August 8th. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, three have issued a Buy rating, eleven have assigned a Hold rating and one has issued a Sell rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Qualys presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $170.53.

About Qualys

Qualys, Inc (NASDAQ: QLYS) is a leading provider of cloud-based security and compliance solutions designed to help organizations streamline their IT security programs. Operating on a unified, modular platform, Qualys offers continuous visibility into global IT assets through a combination of lightweight cloud agents and on-premises scanner appliances. The platform supports an array of security and compliance use cases, enabling real-time detection of vulnerabilities, policy violations and misconfigurations across on-premises, cloud and hybrid environments.

The company’s flagship Qualys Cloud Platform delivers a suite of integrated applications, including vulnerability management, detection and response (VMDR), policy compliance, web application scanning, file integrity monitoring, asset inventory and container security.