Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) Upgraded at StockNews.com

StockNews.com upgraded shares of Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) from a hold rating to a buy rating in a report published on Friday.

FTNT has been the subject of a number of other research reports. Stifel Nicolaus lifted their price target on Fortinet from $103.00 to $115.00 and gave the stock a “hold” rating in a report on Friday, February 7th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted their price target on shares of Fortinet from $99.00 to $105.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Monday, December 16th. Baird R W downgraded shares of Fortinet from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Monday, February 3rd. Needham & Company LLC reissued a “hold” rating on shares of Fortinet in a research note on Friday, February 7th. Finally, Guggenheim reissued a “neutral” rating on shares of Fortinet in a research note on Friday, February 7th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, nineteen have issued a hold rating, twelve have assigned a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $105.69.

Fortinet Stock Up 0.2 %

NASDAQ:FTNT opened at $98.65 on Friday. The stock’s fifty day moving average price is $102.34 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $92.53. Fortinet has a 52-week low of $54.57 and a 52-week high of $114.82. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.67, a quick ratio of 1.39 and a current ratio of 1.47. The company has a market cap of $75.86 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 43.65, a P/E/G ratio of 4.19 and a beta of 0.97.

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, February 6th. The software maker reported $0.67 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates 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 anticipate that Fortinet will post 2.09 EPS for the current year.

Insider Activity at Fortinet

In other Fortinet news, CEO Ken Xie sold 23,044 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, January 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $93.32, for a total value of $2,150,466.08. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 49,039,698 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $4,576,384,617.36. This represents a 0.05 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Also, CFO Keith Jensen sold 23,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, February 19th. The shares were sold at an average price of $113.56, for a total transaction of $2,668,660.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer now directly owns 4,736 shares in the company, valued at $537,820.16. The trade was a 83.23 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 599,988 shares of company stock worth $59,094,530 in the last three months. Company insiders own 18.00% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of Fortinet

Several hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the business. Fairtree Asset Management Pty Ltd purchased a new position in Fortinet in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $633,000. 111 Capital purchased a new position in shares of Fortinet in the fourth quarter valued at $2,195,000. Wealth Enhancement Advisory Services LLC increased its position in Fortinet by 23.9% during the 4th quarter. Wealth Enhancement Advisory Services LLC now owns 93,331 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $8,818,000 after purchasing an additional 18,008 shares in the last quarter. NorthCrest Asset Manangement LLC increased its position in Fortinet by 0.9% during the 4th quarter. NorthCrest Asset Manangement LLC now owns 64,588 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $6,102,000 after purchasing an additional 556 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Centaurus Financial Inc. purchased a new stake in Fortinet during the 4th quarter worth about $256,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 83.71% of the company’s stock.

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.