Tenable (NASDAQ:TENB) and Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) Head-To-Head Analysis

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) and Tenable (NASDAQ:TENB) are both technology companies, but which is the better investment? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their institutional ownership, risk, profitability, earnings, dividends, analyst recommendations and valuation.

Institutional & Insider Ownership

83.7% of Fortinet shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 89.1% of Tenable shares are held by institutional investors. 17.6% of Fortinet shares are held by insiders. Comparatively, 1.7% of Tenable shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Earnings & Valuation

This table compares Fortinet and Tenable”s revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Fortinet	$7.53 billion	15.21	$1.85 billion	$2.84	54.95
Tenable	$1.04 billion	3.18	-$36.12 million	$0.05	602.20

Fortinet has higher revenue and earnings than Tenable. Fortinet is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Tenable, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of current ratings for Fortinet and Tenable, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Fortinet	5	19	10	2	2.25
Tenable	2	11	7	0	2.25

Fortinet currently has a consensus price target of $150.91, suggesting a potential downside of 3.31%. Tenable has a consensus price target of $34.68, suggesting a potential upside of 15.19%. Given Tenable’s higher possible upside, analysts clearly believe Tenable is more favorable than Fortinet.

Profitability

This table compares Fortinet and Tenable’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Fortinet	28.17%	191.54%	21.35%
Tenable	0.65%	14.90%	2.52%

Risk & Volatility

Fortinet has a beta of 1.06, suggesting that its stock price is 6% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Tenable has a beta of 0.96, suggesting that its stock price is 4% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Summary

Fortinet beats Tenable on 11 of the 14 factors compared between the two stocks.

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. The company also provides the Fortinet Unified SASE solutions that include firewall, SD-WAN, Secure web gateway, cloud access services broker, data loss prevention, zero trust network access, and cloud security, including web application firewalls, virtualized firewalls, and cloud-native firewalls. In addition, it offers security operations solutions comprising FortiAI generative AI assistant, FortiSIEM security information and event management, FortiSOAR security orchestration, automation and response, FortiEDR endpoint detection and response, FortiXDR extended detection and response, FortiMDR managed detection and response service, FortiNDR network detection and response, FortiRecon digital risk protection, FortiDeceptor deception technology, FortiGuard SoCaaS, FortiSandbox sandboxing, FortiGuard incident response, and other products. Further, the company offers FortiGuard security services consisting of FortiGuard application security, content security, device security, NOC/SOC security, and web security services; FortiCare technical support services; and training services to customers and channel partners, as well as operates a FortiGuard Lab, a cybersecurity threat intelligence and research organization. It serves enterprise, communication and security service providers, government organizations, and small and medium-sized businesses. The company was incorporated in 2000 and is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California.

About Tenable

Tenable Holdings, Inc. provides cyber exposure solutions for in the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, the Asia Pacific, and Japan. Its platforms include Tenable Vulnerability Management, a cloud-delivered software as a service that provides organizations with a risk-based view of traditional and modern attack surfaces; Tenable Cloud Security, a cloud-native cloud security solutions for security teams to continuously assess the security posture; Tenable Identity Exposure, a solution to secure Active Directory environments; Tenable Web App Scanning, which provides scanning for modern web applications; Tenable Lumin Exposure View, a measurement tool; Tenable Attack Surface Management, an external attack surface management solution; Tenable Security Center, an on-premises solution that provides a risk-based view of an organization’s IT, security and compliance posture; and Tenable OT Security, an operational technology security solution which provides threat detection, asset tracking, vulnerability management, and configuration control capabilities. The company also offers Nessus, a vulnerability assessment solution for cybersecurity industry and enterprise platform; and Nessus Expert, that enables users to programmatically detect cloud infrastructure misconfigurations and vulnerabilities in the design and build phase. Tenable Holdings, Inc. was founded in 2002 and is headquartered in Columbia, Maryland.