Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) Issues Quarterly Earnings Results, Beats Estimates By $0.05 EPS

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) released its earnings results on Thursday. The software maker reported $0.43 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.38 by $0.05, Briefing.com reports. The firm had revenue of $1.35 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.34 billion. Fortinet had a negative return on equity of 5,061.85% and a net margin of 22.23%. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 7.2% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the business posted $0.29 earnings per share. Fortinet updated its Q2 guidance to $0.39-0.41 EPS and its FY24 guidance to $1.73 to $1.79 EPS.

Fortinet Price Performance

NASDAQ:FTNT opened at $58.88 on Friday. The firm’s 50-day simple moving average is $67.53 and its 200 day simple moving average is $61.90. Fortinet has a 52 week low of $44.12 and a 52 week high of $81.24. The firm has a market cap of $44.94 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 38.48, a P/E/G ratio of 2.89 and a beta of 1.08. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 13.38, a quick ratio of 1.06 and a current ratio of 1.19.

Insider Transactions at Fortinet

In related news, VP Michael Xie sold 24,710 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, May 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $64.48, for a total transaction of $1,593,300.80. Following the sale, the vice president now owns 10,867,018 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $700,705,320.64. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. In related news, VP Michael Xie sold 24,710 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, May 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $64.48, for a total value of $1,593,300.80. Following the sale, the vice president now directly owns 10,867,018 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $700,705,320.64. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this link. Also, CEO Ken Xie sold 46,084 shares of Fortinet stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, February 13th. The shares were sold at an average price of $69.07, for a total transaction of $3,183,021.88. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 51,813,638 shares in the company, valued at $3,578,767,976.66. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last ninety days, insiders have sold 118,480 shares of company stock valued at $8,021,556. 17.54% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Analyst Ratings Changes

FTNT has been the subject of a number of analyst reports. Stifel Nicolaus upped their price objective on shares of Fortinet from $52.00 to $78.00 and gave the company a “hold” rating in a research report on Wednesday, February 7th. Scotiabank reduced their target price on shares of Fortinet from $90.00 to $80.00 and set a “sector outperform” rating for the company in a report on Friday. Citigroup downgraded shares of Fortinet from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and upped their price target for the stock from $60.00 to $62.00 in a research note on Tuesday, January 9th. Piper Sandler dropped their target price on shares of Fortinet from $75.00 to $70.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Friday. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company dropped their target price on Fortinet from $70.00 to $62.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a report on Friday. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, twenty have assigned a hold rating and twelve have given a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $70.68.

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.