Insider Selling: Qualys (NASDAQ:QLYS) Insider Sells $139,505.94 in Stock

Qualys, Inc. (NASDAQ:QLYS) insider Bruce Posey sold 882 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, July 20th. The shares were sold at an average price of $158.17, for a total transaction of $139,505.94. Following the transaction, the insider directly owned 62,689 shares in the company, valued at approximately $9,915,519.13. The trade was a 1.39% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this link. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan.

Qualys Stock Performance

Shares of NASDAQ QLYS traded up $3.49 during trading on Tuesday, hitting $138.28. The company had a trading volume of 139,763 shares, compared to its average volume of 758,111. Qualys, Inc. has a 52 week low of $74.51 and a 52 week high of $167.86. The company has a market cap of $4.87 billion, a P/E ratio of 24.82 and a beta of 0.61. The business’s 50-day moving average is $125.87 and its 200 day moving average is $110.48.

Qualys (NASDAQ:QLYS) last announced its earnings results on Tuesday, May 5th. The software maker reported $1.95 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.81 by $0.14. Qualys had a net margin of 29.41% and a return on equity of 37.15%. The company had revenue of $175.64 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $173.63 million. During the same period in the previous year, the business earned $1.67 EPS. The company’s revenue was up 9.8% on a year-over-year basis. Qualys has set its FY 2026 guidance at 7.440-7.650 EPS and its Q2 2026 guidance at 1.730-1.800 EPS. On average, research analysts expect that Qualys, Inc. will post 5.47 EPS for the current year.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of analysts have issued reports on the company. Royal Bank Of Canada reaffirmed a “sector perform” rating and issued a $145.00 target price on shares of Qualys in a report on Thursday, July 16th. Weiss Ratings raised Qualys from a “hold (c-)” rating to a “hold (c)” rating in a report on Thursday, July 16th. TD Cowen boosted their target price on Qualys from $90.00 to $145.00 and gave the stock a “hold” rating in a research report on Monday, July 13th. Morgan Stanley set a $96.00 price target on shares of Qualys in a research report on Wednesday, May 6th. Finally, Piper Sandler reduced their target price on shares of Qualys from $135.00 to $100.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, May 6th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, three have assigned a Buy rating, twelve have issued a Hold rating and one has issued a Sell rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, Qualys currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $142.53.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Qualys

Large investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. First Trust Advisors LP raised its stake in Qualys by 24.1% in the fourth quarter. First Trust Advisors LP now owns 1,372,587 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $182,417,000 after purchasing an additional 266,924 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC boosted its stake in shares of Qualys by 4.0% in the 4th quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 1,256,002 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $168,380,000 after purchasing an additional 48,877 shares during the last quarter. Legal & General Group Plc boosted its holdings in shares of Qualys by 7.0% during the 4th quarter. Legal & General Group Plc now owns 1,156,412 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $153,687,000 after buying an additional 75,397 shares in the last quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC boosted its position in shares of Qualys by 46.9% during the 2nd quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 1,012,100 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $144,133,000 after purchasing an additional 323,324 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership raised its holdings in Qualys by 127.0% during the first quarter. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership now owns 832,796 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $73,161,000 after buying an additional 465,952 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 99.31% of the company’s stock.

About Qualys

Qualys, Inc (NASDAQ: QLYS) is a leading provider of cloud-based security and compliance solutions designed to help organizations streamline their IT security programs. Operating on a unified, modular platform, Qualys offers continuous visibility into global IT assets through a combination of lightweight cloud agents and on-premises scanner appliances. The platform supports an array of security and compliance use cases, enabling real-time detection of vulnerabilities, policy violations and misconfigurations across on-premises, cloud and hybrid environments.

The company’s flagship Qualys Cloud Platform delivers a suite of integrated applications, including vulnerability management, detection and response (VMDR), policy compliance, web application scanning, file integrity monitoring, asset inventory and container security.