Cantor Fitzgerald Reaffirms Neutral Rating for Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT)

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT)‘s stock had its “neutral” rating reissued by equities researchers at Cantor Fitzgerald in a research report issued on Wednesday, Benzinga reports. They presently have a $65.00 target price on the software maker’s stock. Cantor Fitzgerald’s price target indicates a potential upside of 0.59% from the stock’s previous close.

Other equities research analysts also recently issued reports about the company. Daiwa Capital Markets upgraded Fortinet from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $75.00 target price on the stock in a research report on Tuesday, February 13th. Morgan Stanley boosted their target price on Fortinet from $77.00 to $81.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, February 7th. Rosenblatt Securities reiterated a “buy” rating and issued a $85.00 target price on shares of Fortinet in a research report on Wednesday, April 3rd. StockNews.com upgraded Fortinet from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, April 10th. Finally, Piper Sandler reiterated a “neutral” rating and issued a $75.00 target price on shares of Fortinet in a research report on Wednesday, April 3rd. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, twenty have assigned a hold rating and twelve have issued a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $72.03.

Fortinet Price Performance

Shares of NASDAQ FTNT traded up $0.14 during mid-day trading on Wednesday, reaching $64.62. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 2,052,191 shares, compared to its average volume of 5,945,487. The firm has a market capitalization of $49.31 billion, a PE ratio of 44.59, a P/E/G ratio of 2.87 and a beta of 1.08. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 13.38, a current ratio of 1.19 and a quick ratio of 1.06. The stock has a fifty day moving average of $68.83 and a two-hundred day moving average of $61.48. Fortinet has a 52 week low of $44.12 and a 52 week high of $81.24.

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) last released its quarterly earnings data on Monday, February 5th. The software maker reported $0.51 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.43 by $0.08. The firm had revenue of $1.42 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.41 billion. Fortinet had a negative return on equity of 7,572.46% and a net margin of 21.64%. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 10.3% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company posted $0.38 earnings per share. As a group, sell-side analysts anticipate that Fortinet will post 1.39 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Fortinet news, CEO Ken Xie sold 46,084 shares of the stock in a transaction on Tuesday, February 13th. The stock was sold at an average price of $69.07, for a total transaction of $3,183,021.88. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 51,813,638 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,578,767,976.66. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. In other news, VP Michael Xie sold 38,369 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, February 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $66.45, for a total transaction of $2,549,620.05. Following the completion of the sale, the vice president now owns 29,887,018 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,985,992,346.10. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, CEO Ken Xie sold 46,084 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, February 13th. The stock was sold at an average price of $69.07, for a total value of $3,183,021.88. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 51,813,638 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,578,767,976.66. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 108,147 shares of company stock valued at $7,424,394 over the last quarter. 17.54% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Fortinet

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in FTNT. Alliancebernstein L.P. raised its stake in shares of Fortinet by 2.1% during the 2nd quarter. Alliancebernstein L.P. now owns 28,859,057 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $2,181,456,000 after buying an additional 595,952 shares during the last quarter. State Street Corp grew its position in shares of Fortinet by 2.1% in the first quarter. State Street Corp now owns 25,395,593 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $1,687,787,000 after purchasing an additional 527,129 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC grew its position in shares of Fortinet by 1.0% in the first quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 15,178,603 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $1,007,182,000 after purchasing an additional 147,048 shares in the last quarter. Moneta Group Investment Advisors LLC grew its position in shares of Fortinet by 125,937.5% in the fourth quarter. Moneta Group Investment Advisors LLC now owns 14,597,668 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $713,680,000 after purchasing an additional 14,586,086 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Nordea Investment Management AB lifted its holdings in Fortinet by 156.8% in the third quarter. Nordea Investment Management AB now owns 9,441,059 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $554,945,000 after acquiring an additional 5,765,174 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors 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.