Insider Selling: Fortinet, Inc. (NASDAQ:FTNT) CEO Sells 158,486 Shares of Stock

Key Points

• Ken Xie, CEO of Fortinet, Inc., sold 158,486 shares of stock for approximately $15.6 million, reducing his ownership by 0.31% while still holding over 51 million shares valued at around $5.06 billion.
• Fortinet's stock price fell by 2.4% to $96.21 during trading, with a market capital of $73.64 billion and a PE ratio of 39.59 despite a strong performance in quarterly earnings.
• Several analysts have issued varying ratings on Fortinet, with a consensus rating of "Hold" and a price target averaging $107.00, while some firms raised their target prices for the stock.

Fortinet, Inc. (NASDAQ:FTNT - Get Free Report) CEO Ken Xie sold 158,486 shares of Fortinet stock in a transaction on Monday, August 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $98.48, for a total transaction of $15,607,701.28. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer directly owned 51,391,879 shares of the company's stock, valued at $5,061,072,243.92. This represents a 0.31% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link.

Fortinet Stock Performance

FTNT stock traded down $0.91 during mid-day trading on Friday, hitting $74.39. The company had a trading volume of 17,001,530 shares, compared to its average volume of 6,194,551. The firm has a market cap of $56.94 billion, a PE ratio of 29.64, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.59 and a beta of 1.07. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.24, a quick ratio of 1.29 and a current ratio of 1.33. Fortinet, Inc. has a 12 month low of $67.97 and a 12 month high of $114.82. The stock's fifty day moving average price is $101.76 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $101.60.

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT - Get Free Report) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, August 6th. The software maker reported $0.64 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.59 by $0.05. The business had revenue of $1.63 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.63 billion. Fortinet had a net margin of 30.60% and a return on equity of 111.46%. The company's revenue for the quarter was up 13.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $0.57 earnings per share. On average, analysts forecast that Fortinet, Inc. will post 2.09 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Institutional Trading of Fortinet

A number of institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the business. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its stake in shares of Fortinet by 5.2% during the 1st quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 71,662,404 shares of the software maker's stock valued at $6,898,223,000 after buying an additional 3,546,934 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC lifted its stake in Fortinet by 5.2% in the 2nd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 16,916,974 shares of the software maker's stock worth $1,783,091,000 after purchasing an additional 828,569 shares in the last quarter. Invesco Ltd. lifted its stake in Fortinet by 2.2% in the 1st quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 8,570,528 shares of the software maker's stock worth $824,999,000 after purchasing an additional 181,835 shares in the last quarter. UBS AM A Distinct Business Unit of UBS Asset Management Americas LLC lifted its stake in Fortinet by 17.1% in the 1st quarter. UBS AM A Distinct Business Unit of UBS Asset Management Americas LLC now owns 7,016,467 shares of the software maker's stock worth $675,405,000 after purchasing an additional 1,026,277 shares in the last quarter. Finally, FMR LLC lifted its stake in Fortinet by 77.2% in the 4th quarter. FMR LLC now owns 6,531,705 shares of the software maker's stock worth $617,115,000 after purchasing an additional 2,846,475 shares in the last quarter. 83.71% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of brokerages recently weighed in on FTNT. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lowered their target price on shares of Fortinet from $105.00 to $87.00 and set a "neutral" rating for the company in a research note on Thursday. Rosenblatt Securities reissued a "neutral" rating and set a $85.00 target price (down previously from $125.00) on shares of Fortinet in a research note on Thursday. Morgan Stanley cut shares of Fortinet from an "overweight" rating to a "reduce" rating and reduced their price target for the stock from $110.00 to $78.00 in a report on Thursday. Wall Street Zen cut shares of Fortinet from a "buy" rating to a "hold" rating in a report on Saturday. Finally, Roth Capital set a $103.00 price target on shares of Fortinet and gave the stock a "neutral" rating in a report on Tuesday, April 22nd. Two analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, twenty-five have given a hold rating, eight have assigned a buy rating and two have issued a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Fortinet presently has a consensus rating of "Hold" and an average target price of $97.93.

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.