Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) Upgraded at Wall Street Zen

Wall Street Zen upgraded shares of Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) from a hold rating to a buy rating in a research report sent to investors on Saturday morning,Wall Street Zen reports.

FTNT has been the topic of several other research reports. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted their target price on Fortinet from $100.00 to $118.00 and gave the company an “underweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, July 30th. Wells Fargo & Company set a $135.00 price target on shares of Fortinet and gave the stock an “underweight” rating in a research report on Thursday, July 30th. Weiss Ratings raised shares of Fortinet from a “buy (b-)” rating to a “buy (b)” rating in a research report on Thursday. Roth Capital raised their price target on shares of Fortinet from $90.00 to $110.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Wednesday, July 29th. Finally, HC Wainwright reaffirmed a “buy” rating on shares of Fortinet in a research report on Thursday, July 30th. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, ten have issued a Buy rating, twenty-one have assigned a Hold rating and five have given a Sell rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $156.51.

Fortinet Stock Performance

Shares of Fortinet stock opened at $192.94 on Friday. Fortinet has a 12 month low of $73.55 and a 12 month high of $196.87. The company has a quick ratio of 1.19, a current ratio of 1.28 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.32. The stock has a market cap of $141.56 billion, a PE ratio of 67.94, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.64 and a beta of 1.03. The business has a fifty day simple moving average of $167.86 and a 200-day simple moving average of $140.42.

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, July 29th. The software maker reported $0.90 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.75 by $0.15. The business had revenue of $2.05 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.89 billion. Fortinet had a return on equity of 191.54% and a net margin of 28.17%. Fortinet’s revenue for the quarter was up 25.6% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $0.64 earnings per share. 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, sell-side analysts anticipate that Fortinet will post 3.10 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Transactions at Fortinet

In related news, COO John Whittle sold 2,835 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, September 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $168.74, for a total value of $478,377.90. Following the transaction, the chief operating officer directly owned 96,987 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $16,365,586.38. This trade represents a 2.84% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this link. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, VP Michael Xie sold 3,121 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, August 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $162.63, for a total value of $507,568.23. Following the completion of the transaction, the vice president directly owned 9,918,360 shares in the company, valued at $1,613,022,886.80. The trade was a 0.03% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. 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. In the last quarter, insiders sold 221,303 shares of company stock worth $36,164,034. 17.60% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Fortinet

A number of large investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Jacobs & Co. CA acquired a new stake in Fortinet during the 3rd quarter worth $223,000. Schaper Benz & Wise Investment Counsel Inc. WI bought a new stake in shares of Fortinet during the 3rd quarter valued at $227,000. Davidson Trust Co. bought a new stake in shares of Fortinet during the 3rd quarter valued at $206,000. Bullock Wealth Management Group lifted its stake in shares of Fortinet by 1.2% in the 3rd quarter. Bullock Wealth Management Group now owns 8,717 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $1,558,000 after purchasing an additional 102 shares during the period. Finally, Riversedge Advisors LLC lifted its stake in shares of Fortinet by 34.3% in the 3rd quarter. Riversedge Advisors LLC now owns 4,980 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $890,000 after purchasing an additional 1,271 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 83.71% of the company’s stock.

About Fortinet

Fortinet, Inc develops and provides cybersecurity products and services for businesses, governments, and service providers. The company’s portfolio is designed to protect networks, endpoints, applications, cloud environments, and operational technology from cyber threats.

Its offerings include FortiGate next-generation firewalls, FortiSwitch secure networking switches, FortiAP wireless access points, FortiClient endpoint security, and FortiSASE secure access service edge solutions. Fortinet also provides centralized management and analytics through products such as FortiManager and FortiAnalyzer, along with security operations, threat intelligence, and other subscription-based services through its FortiGuard portfolio.

Founded in 2000, Fortinet serves customers globally through direct sales, channel partners, and managed security service providers.