Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) Given New $135.00 Price Target at Scotiabank

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) had its price objective raised by stock analysts at Scotiabank from $115.00 to $135.00 in a report released on Friday,Benzinga reports. The firm presently has a “sector outperform” rating on the software maker’s stock. Scotiabank’s price objective suggests a potential upside of 25.95% from the company’s current price.

A number of other research firms also recently issued reports on FTNT. Needham & Company LLC reissued a “hold” rating on shares of Fortinet in a research report on Friday. BMO Capital Markets lifted their price objective on Fortinet from $88.00 to $100.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a research report on Tuesday, November 19th. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their price objective on Fortinet from $85.00 to $105.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Friday. Guggenheim reissued a “neutral” rating on shares of Fortinet in a research note on Friday. Finally, Mizuho upped their price objective on Fortinet from $68.00 to $78.00 and gave the company an “underperform” rating in a research note on Friday, December 13th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, nineteen have given a hold rating, thirteen have assigned a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $100.83.

Fortinet Stock Up 2.4 %

Shares of FTNT traded up $2.47 during trading hours on Friday, hitting $107.19. The company had a trading volume of 7,887,592 shares, compared to its average volume of 4,365,490. The firm has a fifty day moving average price of $97.13 and a 200-day moving average price of $84.21. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.09, a quick ratio of 1.25 and a current ratio of 1.34. The stock has a market capitalization of $82.15 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 54.11, a P/E/G ratio of 2.65 and a beta of 1.01. Fortinet has a 52-week low of $54.57 and a 52-week high of $110.53.

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, February 6th. The software maker reported $0.67 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.60 by $0.07. Fortinet had a return on equity of 973.30% and a net margin of 26.79%. On average, equities research analysts forecast that Fortinet will post 1.95 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Activity

In other news, Director William H. Neukom purchased 355 shares of Fortinet stock in a transaction on Friday, December 6th. The stock was purchased at an average price of $98.50 per share, with a total value of $34,967.50. Following the transaction, the director now directly owns 150,245 shares in the company, valued at $14,799,132.50. The trade was a 0.24 % increase in their position. The acquisition was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. Also, CEO Ken Xie sold 23,044 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, January 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $93.32, for a total value of $2,150,466.08. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 49,039,698 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $4,576,384,617.36. The trade was a 0.05 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 67,860 shares of company stock valued at $6,469,056 over the last 90 days. 18.00% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several large investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in FTNT. State Street Corp boosted its stake in shares of Fortinet by 2.9% during the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 27,281,279 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $2,115,663,000 after purchasing an additional 766,135 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC raised its position in shares of Fortinet by 2.4% during the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 14,883,012 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $1,151,097,000 after acquiring an additional 354,692 shares during the last quarter. Amundi raised its position in shares of Fortinet by 36.7% during the fourth quarter. Amundi now owns 6,577,467 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $631,700,000 after acquiring an additional 1,766,860 shares during the last quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC increased its holdings in Fortinet by 10.3% in the third quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC now owns 5,787,931 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $448,854,000 after purchasing an additional 542,727 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. increased its holdings in Fortinet by 4.1% in the fourth quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 3,974,625 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $375,523,000 after purchasing an additional 156,766 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors 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.