Fortinet’s (FTNT) Overweight Rating Reiterated at Piper Sandler

Piper Sandler reiterated their overweight rating on shares of Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) in a report issued on Friday morning,Benzinga reports. Piper Sandler currently has a $135.00 price target on the software maker’s stock, up from their previous price target of $120.00.

Other research analysts have also issued reports about the company. UBS Group upped their price target on Fortinet from $70.00 to $83.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday, November 8th. The Goldman Sachs Group upped their target price on shares of Fortinet from $100.00 to $114.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 2nd. Needham & Company LLC restated a “hold” rating on shares of Fortinet in a research report on Friday. Raymond James reaffirmed a “market perform” rating on shares of Fortinet in a research report on Tuesday, January 14th. Finally, Morgan Stanley lifted their target price on Fortinet from $105.00 to $106.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Tuesday, November 19th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, nineteen have assigned a hold rating, thirteen have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $101.43.

Fortinet Price Performance

NASDAQ FTNT opened at $107.66 on Friday. Fortinet has a 1 year low of $54.57 and a 1 year high of $110.53. The company has a fifty day simple moving average of $97.38 and a 200 day simple moving average of $84.94. The company has a current ratio of 1.34, a quick ratio of 1.25 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.09. The company has a market cap of $82.52 billion, a P/E ratio of 47.64, a P/E/G ratio of 2.75 and a beta of 1.01.

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, February 6th. The software maker reported $0.67 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.60 by $0.07. Fortinet had a net margin of 29.30% and a return on equity of 463.85%. On average, sell-side analysts predict that Fortinet will post 2.05 EPS for the current year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, CEO Ken Xie sold 22,916 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, December 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $97.93, for a total value of $2,244,163.88. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 48,983,683 shares in the company, valued at $4,796,972,076.19. The trade was a 0.05 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Also, Director William H. Neukom acquired 355 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Friday, December 6th. The stock was purchased at an average price 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. The trade was a 0.24 % increase in their position. The disclosure for this purchase can be found here. Over the last quarter, insiders have sold 67,860 shares of company stock valued at $6,469,056. 18.00% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Fortinet

Several large investors have recently made changes to their positions in the company. Sequoia Financial Advisors LLC increased its position in Fortinet by 30.4% in the fourth quarter. Sequoia Financial Advisors LLC now owns 15,714 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $1,485,000 after purchasing an additional 3,659 shares during the period. Saturna Capital Corp bought a new position in shares of Fortinet in the 4th quarter valued at about $727,000. Prosperity Wealth Management Inc. bought a new stake in shares of Fortinet during the fourth quarter worth approximately $400,000. Avantax Planning Partners Inc. bought a new stake in shares of Fortinet during the fourth quarter worth approximately $265,000. Finally, Miller Financial Services LLC acquired a new position in Fortinet in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $330,000. 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.