Qualys (NASDAQ:QLYS) Releases FY24 Earnings Guidance

Qualys (NASDAQ:QLYS) updated its FY24 earnings guidance on Tuesday. The company provided earnings per share guidance of $5.06-5.30 for the period, compared to the consensus earnings per share estimate of $5.20. The company issued revenue guidance of $601.5-608.5 million, compared to the consensus revenue estimate of $607.34 million. Qualys also updated its Q2 guidance to $1.27-1.35 EPS.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

QLYS has been the subject of several research analyst reports. TD Cowen started coverage on shares of Qualys in a research report on Tuesday, March 26th. They issued a market perform rating and a $170.00 target price for the company. Robert W. Baird lowered their price objective on Qualys from $175.00 to $170.00 and set a neutral rating for the company in a report on Wednesday. Scotiabank started coverage on Qualys in a report on Friday, April 26th. They set a sector perform rating and a $172.00 target price on the stock. Truist Financial lowered their price target on Qualys from $175.00 to $165.00 and set a hold rating for the company in a report on Wednesday. Finally, Stephens reissued an equal weight rating and set a $190.00 price target on shares of Qualys in a research report on Thursday, February 8th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, eight have given a hold rating and three have given a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of Hold and a consensus target price of $162.23.

Qualys Stock Performance

Shares of QLYS traded up $2.12 during midday trading on Thursday, hitting $151.87. 550,545 shares of the stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 472,215. Qualys has a 1-year low of $113.00 and a 1-year high of $206.35. The business’s 50 day moving average price is $166.59 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $175.87. The firm has a market capitalization of $5.61 billion, a PE ratio of 37.07 and a beta of 0.51.

Qualys (NASDAQ:QLYS) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, February 7th. The software maker reported $1.08 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.82 by $0.26. Qualys had a net margin of 27.34% and a return on equity of 49.06%. The firm had revenue of $144.57 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $144.69 million. As a group, equities research analysts forecast that Qualys will post 3.35 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Transactions at Qualys

In other news, CEO Sumedh S. Thakar sold 4,120 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, March 14th. The stock was sold at an average price of $167.62, for a total transaction of $690,594.40. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 194,481 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $32,598,905.22. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. In related news, CEO Sumedh S. Thakar sold 4,120 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, March 14th. The shares were sold at an average price of $167.62, for a total transaction of $690,594.40. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 194,481 shares in the company, valued at $32,598,905.22. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, insider Bruce K. Posey sold 1,430 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, March 20th. The stock was sold at an average price of $164.91, for a total value of $235,821.30. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now owns 63,057 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $10,398,729.87. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last three months, insiders sold 14,590 shares of company stock worth $2,419,842. Company insiders own 1.00% of the company’s stock.

About Qualys

Qualys, Inc, together with its subsidiaries, provides cloud-based platform delivering information technology (IT), security, and compliance solutions in the United States and internationally. It offers Qualys Cloud Apps, which include Cybersecurity Asset Management and External Attack Surface Management; Vulnerability Management, Detection and Response; Web Application Scanning; Patch Management; Custom Assessment and Remediation; Multi-Vector Endpoint Detection and Response; Context Extended Detection and Response; Policy Compliance; File Integrity Monitoring; and Qualys TotalCloud, as well as Cloud Workload Protection, Cloud Detection and Response, Cloud Security Posture Management, Infrastructure as Code, and Container Security.