Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) Rating Lowered to Hold at StockNews.com

StockNews.com downgraded shares of Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) from a buy rating to a hold rating in a research note published on Tuesday morning.

Other equities analysts have also recently issued research reports about the stock. Rosenblatt Securities increased their price objective on shares of Fortinet from $115.00 to $125.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, February 7th. The Goldman Sachs Group raised their price target on shares of Fortinet from $114.00 to $130.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, February 7th. Susquehanna upped their price objective on Fortinet from $90.00 to $110.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Monday, February 10th. Jefferies Financial Group decreased their price target on Fortinet from $115.00 to $105.00 and set a “hold” rating on the stock in a research note on Monday. Finally, Robert W. Baird reiterated a “neutral” rating and set a $112.00 price objective (up from $105.00) on shares of Fortinet in a research note on Monday, February 3rd. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, twenty-one have assigned a hold rating, eleven have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $105.77.

Fortinet Stock Up 0.4 %

NASDAQ FTNT opened at $96.67 on Tuesday. Fortinet has a twelve month low of $54.57 and a twelve month high of $114.82. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.67, a quick ratio of 1.39 and a current ratio of 1.47. The stock has a market cap of $74.34 billion, a PE ratio of 42.77, a PEG ratio of 4.19 and a beta of 0.97. The firm has a 50-day simple moving average of $103.00 and a 200 day simple moving average of $93.68.

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, February 6th. The software maker reported $0.67 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.60 by $0.07. Fortinet had a return on equity of 256.53% and a net margin of 29.30%. On average, research analysts forecast that Fortinet will post 2.09 EPS for the current year.

Insider Activity at Fortinet

In other Fortinet news, CEO Ken Xie sold 23,044 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, January 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $93.32, for a total transaction of $2,150,466.08. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 49,039,698 shares in the company, valued at approximately $4,576,384,617.36. The trade was a 0.05 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, Director Kenneth A. Goldman sold 2,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, March 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $100.00, for a total value of $200,000.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director now owns 18,612 shares in the company, valued at $1,861,200. This represents a 9.70 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 599,988 shares of company stock worth $59,094,530 over the last 90 days. Insiders own 18.00% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Fortinet

Institutional investors and hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Norges Bank bought a new position in shares of Fortinet during the fourth quarter worth $724,048,000. Schroder Investment Management Group acquired a new stake in Fortinet during the 4th quarter worth $389,867,000. FMR LLC lifted its holdings in Fortinet by 77.2% during the fourth quarter. FMR LLC now owns 6,531,705 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $617,115,000 after acquiring an additional 2,846,475 shares in the last quarter. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership increased its holdings in shares of Fortinet by 39.3% in the fourth quarter. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership now owns 7,622,253 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $720,150,000 after acquiring an additional 2,151,811 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Bessemer Group Inc. increased its holdings in shares of Fortinet by 72.6% in the fourth quarter. Bessemer Group Inc. now owns 4,906,439 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $463,561,000 after acquiring an additional 2,064,016 shares in 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.