Sheets Smith Investment Management Invests $1.50 Million in Fortinet, Inc. (NASDAQ:FTNT)

Sheets Smith Investment Management bought a new position in shares of Fortinet, Inc. (NASDAQ:FTNT) during the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor bought 15,820 shares of the software maker’s stock, valued at approximately $1,495,000. Fortinet comprises 1.3% of Sheets Smith Investment Management’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 28th largest position.

Several other large investors also recently made changes to their positions in FTNT. FMR LLC grew its holdings in shares of Fortinet by 276.3% during the third quarter. FMR LLC now owns 3,685,230 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $285,790,000 after purchasing an additional 2,705,767 shares during the last quarter. Amundi lifted its stake in shares of Fortinet by 36.7% during the fourth quarter. Amundi now owns 6,577,467 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $631,700,000 after acquiring an additional 1,766,860 shares during the period. Los Angeles Capital Management LLC lifted its stake in shares of Fortinet by 136.0% during the fourth quarter. Los Angeles Capital Management LLC now owns 2,919,952 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $275,877,000 after acquiring an additional 1,682,708 shares during the period. State Street Corp lifted 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 acquiring an additional 766,135 shares during the period. Finally, Raymond James Financial Inc. acquired a new position in shares of Fortinet during the fourth quarter valued at $69,381,000. Institutional investors own 83.71% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

FTNT has been the topic of several research reports. Cantor Fitzgerald upped their price target on Fortinet from $95.00 to $110.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Tuesday, February 4th. Robert W. Baird reaffirmed a “neutral” rating and set a $112.00 price target (up previously from $105.00) on shares of Fortinet in a research note on Monday, February 3rd. Scotiabank increased their target price on Fortinet from $115.00 to $135.00 and gave the company a “sector outperform” rating in a research note on Friday, February 7th. Baird R W lowered Fortinet from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Monday, February 3rd. Finally, KeyCorp raised Fortinet from a “sector weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and set a $115.00 target price on the stock in a research note on Thursday, December 19th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, nineteen have issued a hold rating, twelve have assigned a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Fortinet currently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $105.69.

Fortinet Stock Up 0.2 %

FTNT opened at $98.65 on Monday. Fortinet, Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $54.57 and a fifty-two week high of $114.82. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.67, a quick ratio of 1.39 and a current ratio of 1.47. The company has a market capitalization of $75.86 billion, a P/E ratio of 43.65, a P/E/G ratio of 4.19 and a beta of 0.97. The stock has a fifty day moving average of $102.34 and a 200-day moving average of $92.53.

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, February 6th. The software maker reported $0.67 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.60 by $0.07. Fortinet had a return on equity of 256.53% and a net margin of 29.30%. On average, equities analysts expect that Fortinet, Inc. will post 2.09 EPS for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling at Fortinet

In other Fortinet news, Director Kenneth A. Goldman sold 2,000 shares of Fortinet stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, March 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $100.00, for a total value of $200,000.00. Following the transaction, the director now owns 18,612 shares in the company, valued at $1,861,200. The trade was a 9.70 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, CFO Keith Jensen sold 23,500 shares of Fortinet stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, February 19th. The shares were sold at an average price of $113.56, for a total value of $2,668,660.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer now owns 4,736 shares in the company, valued at approximately $537,820.16. This represents a 83.23 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 599,988 shares of company stock worth $59,094,530 over the last 90 days. Insiders own 18.00% 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.