Cloudflare (NYSE:NET) Stock Rating Upgraded by Zacks Research

Cloudflare (NYSE:NET) was upgraded by equities researchers at Zacks Research from a “strong sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a report issued on Tuesday, Zacks reports.

Other analysts have also issued research reports about the company. The Goldman Sachs Group reaffirmed a “buy” rating and set a $389.00 price objective on shares of Cloudflare in a research note on Friday, August 7th. Robert W. Baird set a $330.00 price objective on Cloudflare in a research report on Friday, August 7th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised shares of Cloudflare from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and set a $350.00 target price for the company in a research note on Tuesday. KeyCorp upped their target price on shares of Cloudflare from $300.00 to $375.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Friday, August 7th. Finally, Royal Bank Of Canada upped their target price on shares of Cloudflare from $290.00 to $346.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Friday, August 7th. Twenty-four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, eight have assigned a Hold rating and five have given a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $333.21.

Cloudflare Stock Performance

Shares of NYSE:NET opened at $266.54 on Tuesday. The company has a current ratio of 1.82, a quick ratio of 1.82 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.22. The business’s fifty day moving average price is $319.83 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $249.01. Cloudflare has a one year low of $158.83 and a one year high of $370.35.

Cloudflare (NYSE:NET) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, August 6th. The company reported $0.29 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.27 by $0.02. Cloudflare had a negative return on equity of 3.88% and a negative net margin of 8.21%. The company had revenue of $696.06 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $664.66 million. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $0.21 earnings per share. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 35.9% compared to the same quarter last year. Sell-side analysts forecast that Cloudflare will post 0.03 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, insider Michelle Zatlyn sold 33,003 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, September 8th. The stock was sold at an average price of $277.43, for a total transaction of $9,156,022.29. Following the sale, the insider owned 69,775 shares in the company, valued at $19,357,678.25. This trade represents a 32.11% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, Director Carl Ledbetter sold 5,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, September 14th. The shares were sold at an average price of $312.22, for a total transaction of $1,561,100.00. Following the transaction, the director directly owned 878,073 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $274,151,952.06. This represents a 0.57% decrease in their position. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Insiders have sold a total of 259,057 shares of company stock valued at $79,516,905 in the last quarter. 10.66% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Cloudflare

A number of hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in NET. Jennison Associates LLC raised its position in shares of Cloudflare by 135.8% in the 1st quarter. Jennison Associates LLC now owns 4,394,484 shares of the company’s stock worth $906,758,000 after buying an additional 2,530,872 shares during the period. Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Group Inc. grew its position in Cloudflare by 4.9% during the third quarter. Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Group Inc. now owns 1,046,812 shares of the company’s stock valued at $363,537,000 after acquiring an additional 48,956 shares during the period. Amundi grew its position in Cloudflare by 2.0% during the first quarter. Amundi now owns 1,707,256 shares of the company’s stock valued at $352,275,000 after acquiring an additional 32,804 shares during the period. National Pension Service boosted its position in Cloudflare by 1.6% during the 2nd quarter. National Pension Service now owns 959,987 shares of the company’s stock worth $235,466,000 after purchasing an additional 15,546 shares during the period. Finally, Swiss National Bank boosted its position in Cloudflare by 8.1% during the 1st quarter. Swiss National Bank now owns 927,200 shares of the company’s stock worth $191,318,000 after purchasing an additional 69,800 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 82.68% of the company’s stock.

More Cloudflare News

Here are the key news stories impacting Cloudflare this week:

• Positive Sentiment: JPMorgan upgraded Cloudflare from Neutral to Overweight after the recent selloff, arguing the decline has improved the risk-reward and that revenue growth could accelerate. The bank set a $350 price target. JPMorgan upgrades Cloudflare to Overweight
• Positive Sentiment: A Polen Capital investor letter pointed to accelerating revenue growth and a raised outlook as reasons for an outperform view on NET, offering a constructive long-term growth perspective. Cloudflare shares outperform following accelerating revenue growth and raised outlook
• Neutral Sentiment: Cloudflare’s upcoming Q3 results are the key near-term catalyst. The earnings preview coverage highlights the report and investor focus on what comes next for NET, but provides no results yet. Cloudflare reports Q3 results tomorrow
• Negative Sentiment: Valuation remains a concern ahead of earnings. NET has retreated from its October high, while reported insider selling and options-market signals point to caution about a possible post-earnings decline. Insiders sell as options market points to a drop after earnings
• Negative Sentiment: Jefferies lowered its price target to $320 from $350, reflecting a more cautious outlook even though the revised target remains above the price cited in the coverage. Jefferies lowers Cloudflare price target

Cloudflare Company Profile

Cloudflare, Inc (NYSE: NET) provides cloud connectivity, security and performance services for websites, applications, corporate networks and other internet-connected resources. Its global network is designed to help organizations improve the reliability, speed and security of digital services while reducing the complexity of managing internet infrastructure.

The company’s offerings include content delivery and authoritative domain name system services, distributed denial-of-service protection, web application and application programming interface security, bot management, and network security tools.