Wedbush Issues Positive Forecast for Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) Stock Price

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT - Free Report) had its target price upped by Wedbush from $78.00 to $90.00 in a report issued on Friday morning,Benzinga reports. Wedbush currently has an outperform rating on the software maker's stock.

A number of other research firms have also recently weighed in on FTNT. StockNews.com upgraded shares of Fortinet from a "hold" rating to a "buy" rating in a research note on Friday, October 25th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft lifted their target price on Fortinet from $71.00 to $75.00 and gave the company a "hold" rating in a research note on Wednesday, August 7th. Royal Bank of Canada increased their price objective on shares of Fortinet from $68.00 to $72.00 and gave the company a "sector perform" rating in a report on Wednesday, August 7th. Morgan Stanley lowered their target price on shares of Fortinet from $73.00 to $69.00 and set an "overweight" rating on the stock in a report on Wednesday, July 17th. Finally, Guggenheim downgraded shares of Fortinet from a "buy" rating to a "neutral" rating in a report on Monday, July 29th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, twenty-one have assigned a hold rating and eleven have given a buy rating to the company's stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Fortinet presently has a consensus rating of "Hold" and an average price target of $77.72.

Fortinet Stock Performance

NASDAQ:FTNT traded up $8.36 on Friday, hitting $92.04. The stock had a trading volume of 13,777,675 shares, compared to its average volume of 5,461,583. Fortinet has a 52-week low of $49.63 and a 52-week high of $92.53. The stock has a market cap of $70.40 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 54.46, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.78 and a beta of 1.00. The company has a quick ratio of 1.22, a current ratio of 1.32 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 3.45. The business's 50-day simple moving average is $78.43 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $67.93.

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT - Get Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, August 6th. The software maker reported $0.57 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts' consensus estimates of $0.41 by $0.16. The business had revenue of $1.43 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $1.40 billion. Fortinet had a negative return on equity of 2,160.10% and a net margin of 23.71%. The business's quarterly revenue was up 10.9% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business posted $0.31 earnings per share. As a group, research analysts predict that Fortinet will post 1.75 earnings per share for the current year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, CEO Ken Xie sold 23,538 shares of Fortinet stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, September 18th. The stock was sold at an average price of $74.94, for a total transaction of $1,763,937.72. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 48,878,806 shares of the company's stock, valued at $3,662,977,721.64. The trade was a 0.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Over the last 90 days, insiders sold 70,538 shares of company stock valued at $5,403,559. 18.00% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of the stock. GSA Capital Partners LLP purchased a new stake in Fortinet during the first quarter worth $569,000. Empowered Funds LLC increased its stake in shares of Fortinet by 12.4% in the 1st quarter. Empowered Funds LLC now owns 29,500 shares of the software maker's stock valued at $2,015,000 after purchasing an additional 3,258 shares in the last quarter. Empirical Financial Services LLC d.b.a. Empirical Wealth Management raised its holdings in Fortinet by 43.1% in the 1st quarter. Empirical Financial Services LLC d.b.a. Empirical Wealth Management now owns 6,061 shares of the software maker's stock worth $414,000 after purchasing an additional 1,825 shares during the period. Illinois Municipal Retirement Fund grew its holdings in Fortinet by 6.3% in the first quarter. Illinois Municipal Retirement Fund now owns 159,779 shares of the software maker's stock valued at $10,915,000 after purchasing an additional 9,534 shares during the period. Finally, Forsta AP Fonden increased its position in shares of Fortinet by 7.4% in the first quarter. Forsta AP Fonden now owns 136,700 shares of the software maker's stock valued at $9,338,000 after buying an additional 9,400 shares in the last quarter. 83.71% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

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.