Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) Stock Gets Downgrade from Arete Research

by · The Markets Daily

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT – Get Free Report) was downgraded by equities research analysts at Arete Research from a “buy” rating to a “sell” rating in a research report issued to clients and investors on Wednesday, MarketBeat Ratings reports. They presently have a $117.00 price target on the software maker’s stock. Arete Research’s price target indicates a potential downside of 31.55% from the company’s current price.

Several other analysts have also recently weighed in on the stock. Royal Bank Of Canada boosted their price objective on shares of Fortinet from $185.00 to $205.00 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a research note on Monday, October 12th. Capital One Financial raised their target price on Fortinet from $150.00 to $185.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Thursday, July 30th. HSBC lifted their target price on Fortinet from $102.00 to $107.00 in a report on Friday, July 31st. Bank of America reiterated a “buy” rating on shares of Fortinet in a research report on Monday, July 27th. Finally, Susquehanna increased their price target on Fortinet from $115.00 to $160.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Friday, July 31st. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, eleven have given a Buy rating, twenty-one have given a Hold rating and six have given a Sell rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $161.75.

View Our Latest Stock Report on FTNT

Fortinet Stock Down 0.3%

NASDAQ:FTNT opened at $170.93 on Wednesday. The firm’s 50 day simple moving average is $169.65 and its 200 day simple moving average is $144.56. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.32, a current ratio of 1.28 and a quick ratio of 1.19. Fortinet has a one year low of $73.55 and a one year high of $197.13. The company has a market cap of $125.41 billion, a PE ratio of 60.19, a P/E/G ratio of 3.20 and a beta of 1.03.

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT – Get Free Report) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, July 29th. The software maker reported $0.90 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.75 by $0.15. The firm had revenue of $2.05 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.89 billion. Fortinet had a net margin of 28.17% and a return on equity of 191.54%. The company’s revenue was up 25.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the company posted $0.64 EPS. Fortinet has set its FY 2026 guidance at 3.410-3.470 EPS and its Q3 2026 guidance at 0.830-0.870 EPS. On average, research analysts anticipate that Fortinet will post 3.10 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Transactions at Fortinet

In other Fortinet news, CEO Ken Xie sold 161,482 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Monday, August 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $162.66, for a total transaction of $26,266,662.12. Following the sale, the chief executive officer owned 52,972,372 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $8,616,486,029.52. This represents a 0.30% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. The sale was made to cover tax withholding obligations related to the vesting of equity awards. Also, COO John Whittle sold 2,835 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, September 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $168.74, for a total transaction of $478,377.90. Following the sale, the chief operating officer directly owned 96,987 shares in the company, valued at $16,365,586.38. This trade represents a 2.84% decrease in their position. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Insiders sold a total of 221,303 shares of company stock worth $36,164,034 over the last three months. 17.60% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the business. BlackRock Inc. bought a new position in shares of Fortinet in the second quarter worth about $9,561,650,000. First Trust Advisors LP increased its stake in Fortinet by 45.5% in the 1st quarter. First Trust Advisors LP now owns 11,506,173 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $940,284,000 after buying an additional 3,598,487 shares during the period. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership lifted its holdings in Fortinet by 87.4% during the 1st quarter. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership now owns 9,651,024 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $788,682,000 after buying an additional 4,500,194 shares in the last quarter. Bank of New York Mellon Corp bought a new stake in Fortinet during the 2nd quarter valued at about $1,432,842,000. Finally, Legal & General Group Plc purchased a new stake in Fortinet in the 2nd quarter valued at about $979,062,000. 83.71% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Fortinet Company Profile

(Get Free Report)

Fortinet, Inc develops cybersecurity products and services designed to protect networks, endpoints, applications, cloud environments and operational technology systems. The company’s portfolio includes next-generation firewalls, secure networking products, endpoint security, web application security, email security, identity and access solutions, and security information and event management tools.

Its product offerings include FortiGate network security appliances and cloud-based firewalls, along with FortiSwitch, FortiAP and FortiExtender solutions for secure connectivity.

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