Fortive (NYSE:FTV) Lowered to Hold Rating by Zacks Research

Fortive (NYSE:FTV) was downgraded by analysts at Zacks Research from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a note issued to investors on Tuesday,Zacks.com reports.

FTV has been the topic of several other research reports. Barclays boosted their price objective on Fortive from $56.00 to $63.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a report on Monday, February 9th. Truist Financial cut their price objective on Fortive from $57.00 to $56.00 and set a “hold” rating on the stock in a report on Monday. Citigroup upped their price target on Fortive from $59.00 to $64.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday, February 5th. Royal Bank Of Canada upped their price target on Fortive from $56.00 to $65.00 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a report on Thursday, February 5th. Finally, Morgan Stanley upped their price target on Fortive from $53.00 to $58.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Wednesday, March 18th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, eleven have assigned a Hold rating and two have assigned a Sell rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the stock currently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $60.00.

Fortive Price Performance

FTV stock opened at $60.82 on Tuesday. The company has a current ratio of 0.71, a quick ratio of 0.58 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.36. The company has a market capitalization of $18.73 billion, a PE ratio of 35.16, a P/E/G ratio of 3.30 and a beta of 1.09. Fortive has a 12-month low of $46.34 and a 12-month high of $74.67. The business’s fifty day moving average price is $57.20 and its 200 day moving average price is $54.60.

Fortive (NYSE:FTV) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, February 4th. The technology company reported $0.90 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.83 by $0.07. The firm had revenue of $1.12 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.09 billion. Fortive had a return on equity of 11.98% and a net margin of 12.48%.The company’s quarterly revenue was up 4.7% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $1.17 EPS. Fortive has set its FY 2026 guidance at 2.900-3.000 EPS. On average, sell-side analysts anticipate that Fortive will post 2.94 EPS for the current year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Fortive news, Director Kate Mitchell sold 7,131 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, February 18th. The stock was sold at an average price of $58.34, for a total transaction of $416,022.54. Following the sale, the director owned 31,775 shares in the company, valued at $1,853,753.50. This represents a 18.33% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. 0.92% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in FTV. Dodge & Cox increased its holdings in shares of Fortive by 28.4% in the 3rd quarter. Dodge & Cox now owns 42,595,794 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $2,086,768,000 after acquiring an additional 9,422,189 shares during the last quarter. Norges Bank purchased a new position in shares of Fortive in the 4th quarter valued at about $491,928,000. Northwestern Mutual Wealth Management Co. increased its holdings in shares of Fortive by 102,687.8% in the 4th quarter. Northwestern Mutual Wealth Management Co. now owns 7,487,060 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $413,361,000 after acquiring an additional 7,479,776 shares during the last quarter. Viking Global Investors LP increased its holdings in shares of Fortive by 28.7% in the 3rd quarter. Viking Global Investors LP now owns 20,483,680 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $1,003,495,000 after acquiring an additional 4,571,056 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD increased its holdings in shares of Fortive by 29.2% in the 4th quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 20,046,352 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $1,106,760,000 after acquiring an additional 4,532,031 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 94.94% of the company’s stock.

About Fortive

Fortive Corporation (NYSE: FTV) is a diversified industrial technology company headquartered in Everett, Washington. The company was created through a spin‑off from Danaher Corporation in 2016 and has since focused on building a portfolio of professional instrumentation and industrial technology businesses. In 2020 Fortive completed a further portfolio separation with the spin‑off of Vontier, concentrating Fortive’s activities on higher‑margin instrumentation, software and services.

Fortive’s operations center on professional test and measurement, sensing and monitoring, software‑enabled solutions, and lifecycle services that support industrial and commercial customers.