Cantor Fitzgerald Predicts Weaker Earnings for Fortinet

Fortinet, Inc. (NASDAQ:FTNT) – Stock analysts at Cantor Fitzgerald dropped their FY2025 earnings per share (EPS) estimates for shares of Fortinet in a research note issued on Tuesday, February 4th. Cantor Fitzgerald analyst J. Ruykhaver now expects that the software maker will post earnings per share of $2.17 for the year, down from their previous forecast of $2.20. Cantor Fitzgerald currently has a “Neutral” rating and a $110.00 price objective on the stock. The consensus estimate for Fortinet’s current full-year earnings is $1.95 per share.

Other analysts also recently issued research reports about the company. Stifel Nicolaus lifted their target price on Fortinet from $90.00 to $103.00 and gave the company a “hold” rating in a research report on Wednesday, December 18th. Citigroup boosted their price target on Fortinet from $100.00 to $101.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday, January 17th. Jefferies Financial Group boosted their price target on Fortinet from $95.00 to $105.00 and gave the stock a “hold” rating in a research report on Thursday, December 19th. Hsbc Global Res raised Fortinet from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Monday, November 11th. Finally, Mizuho boosted their price target on Fortinet from $68.00 to $78.00 and gave the stock an “underperform” rating in a research report on Friday, December 13th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, nineteen have assigned a hold rating, thirteen have assigned a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $97.73.

Fortinet Price Performance

NASDAQ:FTNT opened at $102.78 on Wednesday. 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’s 50-day simple moving average is $96.70 and its 200 day simple moving average is $83.92. The company has a market cap of $78.78 billion, a P/E ratio of 51.91, 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 $102.87.

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) last released its earnings results on Thursday, November 7th. The software maker reported $0.56 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.43 by $0.13. The business had revenue of $1.51 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.48 billion. Fortinet had a return on equity of 973.30% and a net margin of 26.79%. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $0.35 earnings per share.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Fortinet

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. New York Life Investment Management LLC lifted its position in Fortinet by 0.5% in the 4th quarter. New York Life Investment Management LLC now owns 94,045 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $8,885,000 after acquiring an additional 463 shares in the last quarter. Lineweaver Wealth Advisors LLC bought a new position in Fortinet in the 4th quarter valued at about $210,000. Allegiance Financial Group Advisory Services LLC bought a new position in Fortinet in the 4th quarter valued at about $381,000. Nwam LLC bought a new position in Fortinet in the 4th quarter valued at about $203,000. Finally, Stegent Equity Advisors Inc. bought a new position in Fortinet in the 4th quarter valued at about $269,000. Institutional investors own 83.71% of the company’s stock.

Insider Transactions at Fortinet

In other news, CEO Ken Xie sold 22,916 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, December 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $97.93, for a total transaction of $2,244,163.88. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 48,983,683 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $4,796,972,076.19. This represents a 0.05 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. Also, Director William H. Neukom acquired 355 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, December 6th. The shares were bought at an average cost of $98.50 per share, for a total transaction of $34,967.50. Following the transaction, the director now directly owns 150,245 shares in the company, valued at approximately $14,799,132.50. This represents a 0.24 % increase in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this purchase can be found here. Insiders have sold 67,860 shares of company stock valued at $6,469,056 in the last 90 days. 18.00% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

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.