Prudential Financial Inc. Lowers Stake in Fortinet, Inc. $FTNT

Prudential Financial Inc. cut its position in Fortinet, Inc. (NASDAQ:FTNT) by 56.2% in the second quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 382,641 shares of the software maker’s stock after selling 490,068 shares during the period. Prudential Financial Inc.’s holdings in Fortinet were worth $40,453,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently modified their holdings of the company. Brighton Jones LLC increased its stake in Fortinet by 2.2% in the 4th quarter. Brighton Jones LLC now owns 10,327 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $976,000 after buying an additional 221 shares in the last quarter. Bison Wealth LLC purchased a new position in shares of Fortinet in the fourth quarter valued at about $585,000. AE Wealth Management LLC boosted its stake in shares of Fortinet by 19.9% in the first quarter. AE Wealth Management LLC now owns 5,358 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $516,000 after acquiring an additional 890 shares during the period. Avantax Advisory Services Inc. grew its position in shares of Fortinet by 30.7% during the first quarter. Avantax Advisory Services Inc. now owns 18,610 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $1,791,000 after purchasing an additional 4,375 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Cetera Investment Advisers purchased a new stake in shares of Fortinet during the first quarter worth about $14,804,000. 83.71% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of research firms recently commented on FTNT. DZ Bank raised Fortinet from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $85.00 price target on the stock in a report on Friday, August 8th. TD Cowen reduced their price objective on shares of Fortinet from $105.00 to $100.00 and set a “hold” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, November 6th. Truist Financial lowered their target price on shares of Fortinet from $125.00 to $95.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, August 7th. Wedbush dropped their target price on shares of Fortinet from $120.00 to $100.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, August 7th. Finally, Daiwa Capital Markets downgraded shares of Fortinet from an “outperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $86.00 price target on the stock. in a report on Wednesday, November 12th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, five have given a Buy rating, twenty-eight have given a Hold rating and two have assigned a Sell rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $90.37.

Fortinet Stock Up 1.2%

NASDAQ FTNT opened at $79.77 on Tuesday. The stock has a 50 day moving average price of $83.58 and a 200-day moving average price of $91.29. Fortinet, Inc. has a one year low of $70.12 and a one year high of $114.82. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.24, a quick ratio of 1.24 and a current ratio of 1.33. The company has a market capitalization of $59.32 billion, a P/E ratio of 31.78, a P/E/G ratio of 3.17 and a beta of 1.08.

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, November 5th. The software maker reported $0.74 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.63 by $0.11. Fortinet had a net margin of 30.60% and a return on equity of 111.46%. The company had revenue of $1.72 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.70 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm earned $0.63 earnings per share. Fortinet’s revenue was up 14.4% on a year-over-year basis. Fortinet has set its FY 2025 guidance at 2.660-2.700 EPS. Q4 2025 guidance at 0.730-0.750 EPS. As a group, equities analysts predict that Fortinet, Inc. will post 2.09 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Activity

In other Fortinet news, VP Michael Xie sold 3,546 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, November 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $86.53, for a total transaction of $306,835.38. Following the sale, the vice president directly owned 10,492,018 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $907,874,317.54. The trade was a 0.03% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Also, CEO Ken Xie sold 158,485 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, November 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $86.51, for a total value of $13,710,537.35. Following the sale, the chief executive officer owned 51,391,879 shares in the company, valued at approximately $4,445,911,452.29. This trade represents a 0.31% decrease in their ownership of the stock. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. 17.20% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

About Fortinet

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.