Meiji Yasuda Asset Management Co Ltd. Raises Stock Holdings in Fortinet, Inc. (NASDAQ:FTNT)

Meiji Yasuda Asset Management Co Ltd. grew its stake in shares of Fortinet, Inc. (NASDAQ:FTNT) by 1.5% during the second quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 44,744 shares of the software maker’s stock after buying an additional 682 shares during the period. Meiji Yasuda Asset Management Co Ltd.’s holdings in Fortinet were worth $2,697,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in FTNT. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD lifted its holdings in Fortinet by 664.8% during the first quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 35,137,089 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $2,400,215,000 after purchasing an additional 30,542,551 shares in the last quarter. Swedbank AB purchased a new position in shares of Fortinet during the 1st quarter valued at $548,013,000. Norges Bank purchased a new position in shares of Fortinet during the 4th quarter valued at $203,501,000. Van ECK Associates Corp boosted its holdings in Fortinet by 94.9% in the 2nd quarter. Van ECK Associates Corp now owns 5,755,599 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $346,890,000 after buying an additional 2,802,446 shares during the period. Finally, Sarasin & Partners LLP purchased a new stake in Fortinet in the 1st quarter worth $120,746,000. 83.71% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities analysts have recently weighed in on FTNT shares. Cantor Fitzgerald upped their price objective on Fortinet from $55.00 to $65.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Wednesday, August 7th. StockNews.com raised shares of Fortinet from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, September 10th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted their price objective on shares of Fortinet from $63.00 to $70.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday, August 7th. Wells Fargo & Company upped their target price on shares of Fortinet from $62.00 to $64.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, August 7th. Finally, Robert W. Baird lifted their price target on shares of Fortinet from $75.00 to $80.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, August 7th. Twenty-three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, ten have given a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Fortinet presently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $71.57.

Insider Transactions at Fortinet

In other Fortinet news, CEO Ken Xie sold 23,538 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, September 18th. The shares were sold at an average price of $74.94, for a total transaction of $1,763,937.72. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 48,878,806 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,662,977,721.64. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. In other Fortinet news, CEO Ken Xie sold 23,538 shares of the stock in a transaction on Wednesday, September 18th. The stock was sold at an average price of $74.94, for a total transaction of $1,763,937.72. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 48,878,806 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,662,977,721.64. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, VP Michael Xie sold 24,712 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Friday, August 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $56.11, for a total value of $1,386,590.32. Following the completion of the transaction, the vice president now directly owns 10,847,018 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $608,626,179.98. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last 90 days, insiders have sold 96,210 shares of company stock valued at $6,337,801. 18.00% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Fortinet Stock Performance

Shares of NASDAQ:FTNT opened at $74.68 on Thursday. The company has a current ratio of 1.32, a quick ratio of 1.22 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 3.45. Fortinet, Inc. has a 12 month low of $44.12 and a 12 month high of $78.08. The company has a market capitalization of $57.05 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 48.81, a PEG ratio of 2.77 and a beta of 1.00. The firm’s 50-day moving average is $67.90 and its 200 day moving average is $65.07.

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, August 6th. The software maker reported $0.57 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.41 by $0.16. The company had revenue of $1.43 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.40 billion. Fortinet had a negative return on equity of 2,160.10% and a net margin of 23.71%. Fortinet’s quarterly revenue was up 10.9% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company posted $0.31 EPS. Research analysts predict that Fortinet, Inc. will post 1.7 EPS 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.