BNP Paribas Financial Markets Grows Stock Position in Qualys, Inc. $QLYS

Key Points

• BNP Paribas Financial Markets boosted its Qualys stake by 41.9% in Q4, buying 69,185 more shares and lifting its holdings to 234,108 shares worth about $31.1 million.
• Qualys posted better-than-expected quarterly results, with EPS of $1.95 and revenue of $175.64 million, while revenue rose 9.8% year over year. The company also issued FY2026 and Q2 2026 guidance above or near analyst expectations.
• Despite solid fundamentals, Wall Street remains cautious: the stock has a consensus rating of “Hold” with an average price target of $122.14, and insiders have also been selling shares recently.

BNP Paribas Financial Markets increased its stake in Qualys, Inc. (NASDAQ:QLYS - Free Report) by 41.9% in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund owned 234,108 shares of the software maker's stock after acquiring an additional 69,185 shares during the period. BNP Paribas Financial Markets owned about 0.65% of Qualys worth $31,113,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other institutional investors also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its position in Qualys by 2.9% in the third quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 4,401,798 shares of the software maker's stock valued at $582,490,000 after purchasing an additional 123,962 shares during the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC grew its holdings in shares of Qualys by 4.0% in the fourth quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 1,256,002 shares of the software maker's stock worth $168,380,000 after purchasing an additional 48,877 shares during the last quarter. Legal & General Group Plc increased its stake in shares of Qualys by 7.0% in the fourth 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 during the period. AQR Capital Management LLC increased its stake in shares of Qualys by 46.9% in the second quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 1,012,100 shares of the software maker's stock worth $144,133,000 after buying an additional 323,324 shares during the period. Finally, Fundsmith LLP raised its holdings in Qualys by 21.2% during the 3rd quarter. Fundsmith LLP now owns 870,859 shares of the software maker's stock valued at $115,241,000 after buying an additional 152,257 shares during the last quarter. 99.31% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of research firms have issued reports on QLYS. Wedbush decreased their price objective on shares of Qualys from $155.00 to $125.00 and set an "outperform" rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, May 7th. Morgan Stanley set a $96.00 target price on Qualys in a research note on Wednesday, May 6th. DA Davidson lowered their price target on Qualys from $135.00 to $125.00 and set a "neutral" rating for the company in a research report on Friday, February 6th. Truist Financial dropped their price objective on Qualys from $120.00 to $85.00 and set a "hold" rating for the company in a report on Friday, April 24th. Finally, Weiss Ratings lowered Qualys from a "hold (c-)" rating to a "sell (d+)" rating in a research report on Wednesday, May 20th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, two have assigned a Buy rating, eleven have given a Hold rating and three have issued a Sell rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company currently has an average rating of "Hold" and a consensus price target of $122.14.

Qualys Stock Performance

QLYS stock opened at $111.53 on Friday. Qualys, Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $74.51 and a fifty-two week high of $155.47. The company has a market capitalization of $3.93 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 20.02 and a beta of 0.66. The business's 50 day moving average price is $91.92 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $112.67.

Qualys (NASDAQ:QLYS - Get Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, May 5th. The software maker reported $1.95 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.81 by $0.14. The company had revenue of $175.64 million for the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $173.63 million. Qualys had a return on equity of 37.15% and a net margin of 29.41%.The firm's revenue for the quarter was up 9.8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the firm earned $1.67 earnings per share. Qualys has set its FY 2026 guidance at 7.440-7.650 EPS and its Q2 2026 guidance at 1.730-1.800 EPS. Sell-side analysts forecast that Qualys, Inc. will post 5.47 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Activity at Qualys

In related news, CEO Sumedh S. Thakar sold 13,200 shares of the firm's stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, June 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $114.73, for a total transaction of $1,514,436.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer owned 249,886 shares of the company's stock, valued at $28,669,420.78. This trade represents a 5.02% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, insider Bruce K. Posey sold 2,384 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, May 19th. The shares were sold at an average price of $100.18, for a total transaction of $238,829.12. Following the sale, the insider directly owned 66,301 shares in the company, valued at $6,642,034.18. This trade represents a 3.47% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Insiders sold a total of 19,172 shares of company stock valued at $2,124,751 in the last 90 days. Corporate insiders own 0.88% 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.

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