UNIVEST FINANCIAL Corp Sells 19,131 Shares of Fortinet, Inc. $FTNT

UNIVEST FINANCIAL Corp cut its position in shares of Fortinet, Inc. (NASDAQ:FTNT) by 26.6% during the third quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The firm owned 52,681 shares of the software maker’s stock after selling 19,131 shares during the period. UNIVEST FINANCIAL Corp’s holdings in Fortinet were worth $9,417,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

A number of other large investors have also modified their holdings of FTNT. BlackRock Inc. acquired a new position in shares of Fortinet in the 2nd quarter valued at $9,561,650,000. Bank of New York Mellon Corp bought a new position in shares of Fortinet during the 2nd quarter worth about $1,432,842,000. Legal & General Group Plc acquired a new stake in shares of Fortinet during the 2nd quarter valued at about $979,062,000. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership boosted its position in shares of Fortinet by 87.4% during the 1st quarter. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership now owns 9,651,024 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $788,682,000 after acquiring an additional 4,500,194 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Bank of America Corp DE bought a new stake in Fortinet in the second quarter valued at about $656,852,000. 83.71% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several research firms recently issued reports on FTNT. Wall Street Zen raised shares of Fortinet from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Saturday, October 10th. Susquehanna decreased their price objective on Fortinet from $160.00 to $145.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Friday, October 30th. Rosenblatt Securities lowered their price objective on Fortinet from $195.00 to $175.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, October 29th. Mizuho set a $118.00 target price on Fortinet in a report on Thursday, October 29th. Finally, Evercore set a $165.00 target price on Fortinet in a report on Thursday, July 30th. Eleven research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, twenty-four have assigned a Hold rating and six have issued a Sell rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company currently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $150.44.

Fortinet Stock Up 3.7%

Shares of NASDAQ:FTNT opened at $128.10 on Thursday. The company’s fifty day moving average is $165.56 and its 200-day moving average is $130.19. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.22, a quick ratio of 1.28 and a current ratio of 1.40. Fortinet, Inc. has a 52 week low of $73.55 and a 52 week high of $197.13. The company has a market capitalization of $94.12 billion, a PE ratio of 41.59, a P/E/G ratio of 2.37 and a beta of 1.04.

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) last announced its earnings results on Wednesday, October 28th. The software maker reported $0.91 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.86 by $0.05. Fortinet had a net margin of 28.96% and a return on equity of 152.72%. The business had revenue of $2.08 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $2.06 billion. During the same quarter last year, the company posted $0.74 EPS. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 20.5% on a year-over-year basis. Equities research analysts predict that Fortinet, Inc. will post 3.21 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling at Fortinet

In other news, COO John Whittle sold 53,865 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, September 14th. The shares were sold at an average price of $165.44, for a total transaction of $8,911,425.60. Following the completion of the sale, the chief operating officer owned 96,987 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $16,045,529.28. This trade represents a 35.71% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this link. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, CEO Ken Xie sold 161,483 shares of Fortinet stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, November 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $129.31, for a total transaction of $20,881,366.73. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer owned 52,972,372 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $6,849,857,423.32. This trade represents a 0.30% decrease in their position. 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. Insiders have sold a total of 221,304 shares of company stock worth $30,675,309 over the last ninety days. Corporate insiders own 17.60% of the company’s stock.

Fortinet Profile

Fortinet, Inc. is a cybersecurity and networking company that provides products and services to help organizations protect their networks, devices, applications, and cloud environments. Its offerings include FortiGate next-generation firewalls, the FortiOS operating system, and security, endpoint, cloud, and secure access service edge (SASE) solutions. The company’s Security Fabric platform is designed to integrate security and networking products and support centralized visibility and management.