James Goetz Sells 20,000 Shares of Palo Alto Networks (NASDAQ:PANW) Stock

Palo Alto Networks, Inc. (NASDAQ:PANW) Director James Goetz sold 20,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Friday, June 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $279.90, for a total transaction of $5,598,000.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director directly owned 20,000 shares in the company, valued at $5,598,000. This represents a 50.00% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink.

Palo Alto Networks Trading Up 0.8%

PANW opened at $282.13 on Thursday. The stock has a market capitalization of $229.94 billion, a P/E ratio of 231.25, a P/E/G ratio of 10.39 and a beta of 0.94. Palo Alto Networks, Inc. has a 12 month low of $139.57 and a 12 month high of $302.95. The firm’s fifty day simple moving average is $223.60 and its 200 day simple moving average is $191.30. The company has a current ratio of 0.86, a quick ratio of 0.86 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.04.

Palo Alto Networks (NASDAQ:PANW) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, June 2nd. The network technology company reported $0.85 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.79 by $0.06. The business had revenue of $3 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $2.94 billion. Palo Alto Networks had a net margin of 7.95% and a return on equity of 10.53%. The firm’s revenue was up 31.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $0.37 EPS. Palo Alto Networks has set its FY 2026 guidance at 3.770-3.790 EPS and its Q4 2026 guidance at 0.960-0.980 EPS. As a group, research analysts anticipate that Palo Alto Networks, Inc. will post 2.03 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Palo Alto Networks

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the business. Norges Bank acquired a new position in shares of Palo Alto Networks during the 4th quarter worth about $1,415,364,000. Bank of America Corp DE lifted its stake in Palo Alto Networks by 16.0% in the 1st quarter. Bank of America Corp DE now owns 22,476,753 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $3,603,473,000 after purchasing an additional 3,101,267 shares during the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its stake in Palo Alto Networks by 4.1% in the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 67,929,063 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $12,512,533,000 after purchasing an additional 2,659,100 shares during the last quarter. Harel Insurance Investments & Financial Services Ltd. lifted its stake in Palo Alto Networks by 1,665.1% in the 1st quarter. Harel Insurance Investments & Financial Services Ltd. now owns 2,761,909 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $442,788,000 after purchasing an additional 2,605,433 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Amundi lifted its stake in Palo Alto Networks by 67.1% in the 1st quarter. Amundi now owns 6,297,833 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $1,009,669,000 after purchasing an additional 2,528,299 shares during the last quarter. 79.82% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

PANW has been the topic of several research reports. Wedbush boosted their price objective on shares of Palo Alto Networks from $300.00 to $340.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, June 3rd. Citigroup reaffirmed a “market outperform” rating on shares of Palo Alto Networks in a research report on Wednesday, June 3rd. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft boosted their price objective on shares of Palo Alto Networks from $220.00 to $350.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, June 3rd. Wolfe Research reiterated an “outperform” rating and issued a $320.00 price target on shares of Palo Alto Networks in a research note on Wednesday, June 3rd. Finally, BMO Capital Markets lifted their price target on shares of Palo Alto Networks from $270.00 to $335.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, June 3rd. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, thirty-eight have issued a Buy rating, eight have given a Hold rating and one has given a Sell rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $306.59.

About Palo Alto Networks

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.