Nisa Investment Advisors LLC Boosts Stake in Fortinet, Inc. $FTNT

Nisa Investment Advisors LLC increased its position in Fortinet, Inc. (NASDAQ:FTNT) by 0.9% during the second quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 204,660 shares of the software maker’s stock after buying an additional 1,731 shares during the period. Nisa Investment Advisors LLC’s holdings in Fortinet were worth $21,637,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other large investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in FTNT. Vanguard Group Inc. increased its stake in Fortinet by 5.2% in the 1st quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 71,662,404 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $6,898,223,000 after acquiring an additional 3,546,934 shares during the last quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC increased its position in Fortinet by 40.9% in the first 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 last quarter. Nuveen LLC bought a new stake in shares of Fortinet in the 1st quarter worth about $153,576,000. UBS AM A Distinct Business Unit of UBS Asset Management Americas LLC increased its holdings in shares of Fortinet by 17.1% in the 1st 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 worth $675,405,000 after buying an additional 1,026,277 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Montrusco Bolton Investments Inc. bought a new stake in shares of Fortinet in the 2nd quarter worth about $108,056,000. Institutional investors own 83.71% of the company’s stock.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, CEO Ken Xie sold 158,486 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, August 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $98.48, for a total value of $15,607,701.28. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer owned 51,391,879 shares in the company, valued at approximately $5,061,072,243.92. The trade was a 0.31% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, VP Michael Xie sold 476,596 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Monday, August 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $98.48, for a total value of $46,935,174.08. Following the completion of the sale, the vice president owned 9,730,560 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $958,265,548.80. This represents a 4.67% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 18.00% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several brokerages have weighed in on FTNT. Stifel Nicolaus reduced their price objective on Fortinet from $95.00 to $85.00 and set a “hold” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, August 7th. TD Cowen reissued a “hold” rating and set a $105.00 target price on shares of Fortinet in a research report on Thursday, August 7th. UBS Group cut their target price on Fortinet from $105.00 to $90.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, August 7th. Citigroup cut shares of Fortinet from a “neutral” rating to a “mixed” rating in a research report on Monday, October 20th. Finally, BMO Capital Markets cut their price objective on shares of Fortinet from $110.00 to $90.00 and set a “market perform” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, August 7th. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, eight have given a Buy rating, twenty-five have issued a Hold rating and two have given a Sell rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, Fortinet currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $97.03.

Fortinet Stock Up 0.7%

Shares of FTNT opened at $85.56 on Monday. The firm has a market capitalization of $65.56 billion, a P/E ratio of 34.09, a P/E/G ratio of 3.22 and a beta of 1.09. Fortinet, Inc. has a 12-month low of $70.12 and a 12-month high of $114.82. The company has a current ratio of 1.33, a quick ratio of 1.24 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.24. The firm has a fifty day moving average price of $81.97 and a 200-day moving average price of $93.93.

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) last issued its earnings results on Wednesday, August 6th. The software maker reported $0.64 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.59 by $0.05. The firm had revenue of $1.63 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.63 billion. Fortinet had a net margin of 30.60% and a return on equity of 111.46%. The business’s revenue was up 13.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $0.57 earnings per share. Equities research analysts expect that Fortinet, Inc. will post 2.09 earnings per share for the current year.

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.