Patron Partners LLC Boosts Stake in Palo Alto Networks, Inc. $PANW

Patron Partners LLC grew its holdings in Palo Alto Networks, Inc. (NASDAQ:PANW) by 211.2% during the 3rd quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 4,846 shares of the network technology company’s stock after purchasing an additional 3,289 shares during the period. Patron Partners LLC’s holdings in Palo Alto Networks were worth $987,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently modified their holdings of the business. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its stake in Palo Alto Networks by 2.0% during the second quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 64,016,374 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $13,100,311,000 after buying an additional 1,240,830 shares during the period. Geode Capital Management LLC boosted its position in shares of Palo Alto Networks by 1.1% during 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 purchasing an additional 169,055 shares during the period. First Trust Advisors LP raised its position in Palo Alto Networks by 7.7% in the second quarter. First Trust Advisors LP now owns 5,295,588 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $1,083,689,000 after purchasing an additional 377,496 shares during the period. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. raised its position in Palo Alto Networks by 1.2% in the second quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 4,476,638 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $916,099,000 after purchasing an additional 54,601 shares during the period. Finally, Norges Bank acquired a new position in Palo Alto Networks during the second quarter worth $675,865,000. 79.82% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

PANW has been the subject of a number of research reports. The Goldman Sachs Group reaffirmed a “buy” rating and issued a $240.00 price objective (up from $236.00) on shares of Palo Alto Networks in a research note on Thursday, November 20th. Mizuho set a $220.00 target price on Palo Alto Networks in a research note on Tuesday, December 16th. TD Cowen raised their target price on Palo Alto Networks from $230.00 to $255.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, November 13th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. reaffirmed an “overweight” rating and issued a $235.00 target price on shares of Palo Alto Networks in a research report on Wednesday, December 17th. Finally, Oppenheimer reissued an “outperform” rating and set a $245.00 price target on shares of Palo Alto Networks in a research report on Thursday, November 20th. Thirty-one analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, seven have given a Hold rating and two have assigned a Sell rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $229.09.

Insider Activity

In other Palo Alto Networks news, CAO Josh D. Paul sold 800 shares of Palo Alto Networks stock in a transaction dated Friday, January 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $184.81, for a total transaction of $147,848.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief accounting officer directly owned 46,005 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $8,502,184.05. The trade was a 1.71% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. Also, Director James J. Goetz sold 12,500 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Monday, December 8th. The shares were sold at an average price of $195.33, for a total value of $2,441,625.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director owned 75,184 shares in the company, valued at approximately $14,685,690.72. The trade was a 14.26% decrease in their position. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. In the last three months, insiders have sold 382,016 shares of company stock worth $76,386,460. 1.40% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Palo Alto Networks Price Performance

PANW stock opened at $180.18 on Monday. The business’s 50-day moving average is $188.56 and its two-hundred day moving average is $194.96. The firm has a market capitalization of $125.59 billion, a P/E ratio of 114.04, a P/E/G ratio of 4.29 and a beta of 0.76. 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 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.89 by $0.04. Palo Alto Networks had a net margin of 11.69% and a return on equity of 17.05%. The firm had revenue of $2.47 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.46 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the firm earned $1.56 earnings per share. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 15.7% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, analysts expect that Palo Alto Networks, Inc. will post 1.76 EPS for the current year.

Palo Alto Networks Profile

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.