Mizuho Cuts Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) Price Target to $72.00

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) had its target price decreased by Mizuho from $75.00 to $72.00 in a report published on Thursday morning,Benzinga reports. Mizuho currently has an underperform rating on the software maker’s stock.

A number of other equities research analysts have also recently commented on the company. KeyCorp cut Fortinet from an “overweight” rating to a “sector weight” rating in a research note on Thursday, August 7th. Morgan Stanley restated an “underweight” rating and set a $67.00 price objective (down previously from $78.00) on shares of Fortinet in a report on Tuesday, September 2nd. Weiss Ratings reaffirmed a “hold (c+)” rating on shares of Fortinet in a research report on Wednesday, October 8th. Erste Group Bank downgraded shares of Fortinet from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Thursday, August 14th. Finally, Robert W. Baird cut their price target on shares of Fortinet from $90.00 to $86.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, seven have assigned a Buy rating, twenty-six have assigned a Hold rating and two have assigned a Sell rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $92.48.

Fortinet Stock Up 1.6%

Shares of Fortinet stock opened at $81.79 on Thursday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.24, a current ratio of 1.33 and a quick ratio of 1.24. The stock has a market cap of $62.67 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 32.59, a PEG ratio of 3.17 and a beta of 1.08. The firm’s 50-day moving average is $83.16 and its two-hundred day moving average is $93.10. Fortinet has a 1 year low of $70.12 and a 1 year high of $114.82.

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, November 5th. The software maker reported $0.74 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.63 by $0.11. The business had revenue of $1.72 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.70 billion. Fortinet had a return on equity of 111.46% and a net margin of 30.60%.The business’s revenue was up 14.4% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the business posted $0.63 EPS. Fortinet has set its FY 2025 guidance at 2.660-2.700 EPS. Q4 2025 guidance at 0.730-0.750 EPS. As a group, research analysts expect that Fortinet will post 2.09 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, VP Michael Xie sold 3,546 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Monday, November 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $86.53, for a total value of $306,835.38. Following the completion of the sale, the vice president owned 10,492,018 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $907,874,317.54. The trade was a 0.03% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, CEO Ken Xie sold 158,485 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, November 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $86.51, for a total transaction of $13,710,537.35. Following the sale, the chief executive officer directly owned 51,391,879 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $4,445,911,452.29. This represents a 0.31% decrease in their position. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. 17.20% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Fortinet

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in FTNT. Brighton Jones LLC grew its holdings in shares of Fortinet by 2.2% in the fourth quarter. Brighton Jones LLC now owns 10,327 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $976,000 after purchasing an additional 221 shares during the period. Bison Wealth LLC purchased a new position in Fortinet during the fourth quarter worth about $585,000. OneDigital Investment Advisors LLC raised its stake in shares of Fortinet by 20.6% in the 1st quarter. OneDigital Investment Advisors LLC now owns 6,438 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $620,000 after acquiring an additional 1,099 shares during the period. World Investment Advisors lifted its position in shares of Fortinet by 20.7% during the first quarter. World Investment Advisors now owns 3,758 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $362,000 after purchasing an additional 644 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Brown Advisory Inc. lifted its holdings in Fortinet by 2.5% during the 1st quarter. Brown Advisory Inc. now owns 106,280 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $10,231,000 after buying an additional 2,544 shares in the last quarter. 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.