Insider Selling: Palo Alto Networks (NASDAQ:PANW) EVP Sells $10,769,000.00 in Stock

Palo Alto Networks, Inc. (NASDAQ:PANW) EVP Dipak Golechha sold 27,500 shares of Palo Alto Networks stock in a transaction on Thursday, September 24th. The stock was sold at an average price of $391.60, for a total transaction of $10,769,000.00. Following the transaction, the executive vice president owned 117,750 shares in the company, valued at $46,110,900. This represents a 18.93% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink.

Palo Alto Networks Price Performance

Shares of Palo Alto Networks stock traded up $17.35 during trading hours on Monday, hitting $392.09. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 5,988,905 shares, compared to its average volume of 8,412,000. The company has a market cap of $320.73 billion, a PE ratio of 768.82, a PEG ratio of 10.79 and a beta of 0.91. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.06, a quick ratio of 0.87 and a current ratio of 0.87. The business has a 50 day moving average price of $356.02 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $277.55. Palo Alto Networks, Inc. has a 12-month low of $139.57 and a 12-month high of $398.88.

Palo Alto Networks (NASDAQ:PANW) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, September 1st. The network technology company reported $1.02 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.98 by $0.04. Palo Alto Networks had a return on equity of 8.50% and a net margin of 2.67%.The company had revenue of $3.41 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $3.35 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the company earned $0.95 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue was up 34.5% on a year-over-year basis. Palo Alto Networks has set its FY 2027 guidance at 4.160-4.190 EPS and its Q1 2027 guidance at 0.960-0.980 EPS. Analysts expect that Palo Alto Networks, Inc. will post 2.31 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Institutional Trading of Palo Alto Networks

Large investors have recently made changes to their positions in the company. BlackRock Inc. acquired a new stake in shares of Palo Alto Networks in the second quarter valued at approximately $25,833,462,000. Norges Bank purchased a new stake in Palo Alto Networks in the fourth quarter valued at $1,415,364,000. Legal & General Group Plc acquired a new position in Palo Alto Networks in the second quarter valued at about $1,968,304,000. Bank of New York Mellon Corp acquired a new stake in Palo Alto Networks in the 2nd quarter valued at approximately $1,569,755,000. Finally, Deutsche Bank AG acquired a new position in Palo Alto Networks during the 2nd quarter worth about $1,481,236,000. 79.82% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of research analysts have recently commented on PANW shares. Jefferies Financial Group reaffirmed a “buy” rating and set a $450.00 target price (up from $335.00) on shares of Palo Alto Networks in a research note on Friday, August 28th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft reiterated a “buy” rating and issued a $430.00 price target (up from $350.00) on shares of Palo Alto Networks in a report on Wednesday, September 2nd. Oppenheimer reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and issued a $450.00 price objective (up from $400.00) on shares of Palo Alto Networks in a research note on Wednesday, September 2nd. Susquehanna lifted their price objective on shares of Palo Alto Networks from $350.00 to $415.00 and gave the company a “positive” rating in a report on Wednesday, September 2nd. Finally, Benchmark raised their price objective on Palo Alto Networks from $340.00 to $400.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Monday, August 24th. Thirty-eight research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and twelve have given a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $390.47.

Palo Alto Networks Company Profile

Palo Alto Networks, Inc is a cybersecurity company that provides solutions designed to help organizations protect networks, endpoints, cloud environments, applications and users from cyber threats. Its offerings include next-generation firewalls, cloud-delivered security services, secure access service edge (SASE) solutions, endpoint protection and security operations tools.

The company also provides platforms and services for cloud security, threat intelligence, incident response, vulnerability management and the automation of security operations.