Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) Trading 1% Higher – Here’s Why

Shares of Fortinet, Inc. (NASDAQ:FTNT) traded up 1% on Monday . The company traded as high as $110.67 and last traded at $109.08. 1,105,250 shares changed hands during mid-day trading, a decline of 76% from the average session volume of 4,573,398 shares. The stock had previously closed at $108.01.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several equities research analysts recently weighed in on FTNT shares. The Goldman Sachs Group boosted their target price on Fortinet from $114.00 to $130.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, February 7th. Raymond James reissued a “market perform” rating on shares of Fortinet in a research report on Tuesday, January 14th. Royal Bank of Canada upped their price objective on shares of Fortinet from $97.00 to $115.00 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a report on Friday, February 7th. Bank of America lifted their target price on shares of Fortinet from $87.00 to $104.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, November 19th. Finally, Jefferies Financial Group upped their price target on shares of Fortinet from $95.00 to $105.00 and gave the company a “hold” rating in a report on Thursday, December 19th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, nineteen have assigned a hold rating, twelve have assigned a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $103.72.

Fortinet Trading Down 1.4 %

The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.67, a current ratio of 1.47 and a quick ratio of 1.39. The business’s 50 day simple moving average is $101.31 and its 200 day simple moving average is $89.99. The stock has a market cap of $81.93 billion, a P/E ratio of 47.14, a PEG ratio of 4.19 and a beta of 1.01.

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, February 6th. The software maker reported $0.67 EPS 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, analysts expect that Fortinet, Inc. will post 2.09 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Activity

In other news, Director William H. Neukom purchased 355 shares of Fortinet stock in a transaction on Friday, December 6th. The shares were purchased at an average cost of $98.50 per share, for a total transaction of $34,967.50. Following the completion of the transaction, the director now directly owns 150,245 shares in the company, valued at approximately $14,799,132.50. This represents a 0.24 % increase in their ownership of the stock. The purchase was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, CEO Ken Xie sold 22,916 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, December 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $97.93, for a total transaction of $2,244,163.88. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 48,983,683 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $4,796,972,076.19. The trade was a 0.05 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last quarter, insiders have sold 87,120 shares of company stock worth $8,991,409. Corporate insiders own 18.00% of the company’s stock.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Fortinet

Institutional investors and hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the business. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its holdings in shares of Fortinet by 1.1% in the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 68,115,470 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $6,435,550,000 after buying an additional 730,994 shares during the last quarter. State Street Corp increased its position in Fortinet by 2.9% in the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 27,281,279 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $2,115,663,000 after acquiring an additional 766,135 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC raised its stake in shares of Fortinet by 2.6% in the fourth quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 15,270,913 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $1,440,648,000 after acquiring an additional 387,901 shares during the last quarter. Invesco Ltd. lifted its position in shares of Fortinet by 31.3% during the fourth quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 8,388,693 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $792,564,000 after purchasing an additional 2,000,888 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Norges Bank bought a new stake in shares of Fortinet during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $724,048,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds 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.