Scotia Capital Inc. Cuts Stock Position in Fortinet, Inc. $FTNT

Scotia Capital Inc. trimmed its holdings in shares of Fortinet, Inc. (NASDAQ:FTNT) by 1.7% in the 2nd quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm owned 118,743 shares of the software maker’s stock after selling 2,046 shares during the quarter. Scotia Capital Inc.’s holdings in Fortinet were worth $12,553,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other institutional investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in FTNT. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its position in Fortinet by 1.4% during the second quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 72,686,920 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $7,684,461,000 after acquiring an additional 1,024,516 shares during the period. Geode Capital Management LLC increased its stake in shares of Fortinet by 5.2% during the second 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. raised its position in shares of Fortinet by 2.2% during 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 during 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 valued at $675,405,000 after buying an additional 1,026,277 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Northern Trust Corp boosted its holdings in Fortinet by 0.8% in the 1st quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 6,519,558 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $627,573,000 after buying an additional 49,238 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 83.71% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

FTNT has been the subject of a number of research analyst reports. Citigroup cut Fortinet from a “neutral” rating to a “mixed” rating in a report on Monday, October 20th. BMO Capital Markets dropped their price target on Fortinet from $110.00 to $90.00 and set a “market perform” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, August 7th. Wedbush decreased their price objective on Fortinet from $120.00 to $100.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, August 7th. DZ Bank raised shares of Fortinet from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $85.00 target price on the stock in a research note on Friday, August 8th. Finally, Erste Group Bank lowered shares of Fortinet from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Thursday, August 14th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, five have given a Buy rating, twenty-eight have given a Hold rating and two have given a Sell rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Fortinet presently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $90.37.

Fortinet Stock Up 0.7%

Shares of FTNT opened at $81.13 on Friday. Fortinet, Inc. has a 52-week low of $70.12 and a 52-week high of $114.82. The company has a market capitalization of $60.33 billion, a PE ratio of 32.32, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.17 and a beta of 1.08. The stock has a fifty day simple moving average of $83.53 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $90.88. The company has a quick ratio of 1.24, a current ratio of 1.33 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.24.

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, November 5th. The software maker reported $0.74 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.63 by $0.11. Fortinet had a net margin of 30.60% and a return on equity of 111.46%. The firm had revenue of $1.72 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.70 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $0.63 EPS. The company’s revenue was up 14.4% compared to the same quarter last year. Fortinet has set its FY 2025 guidance at 2.660-2.700 EPS. Q4 2025 guidance at 0.730-0.750 EPS. As a group, equities analysts forecast that Fortinet, Inc. will post 2.09 EPS for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, CEO Ken Xie sold 158,485 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, November 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $86.51, for a total transaction of $13,710,537.35. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer owned 51,391,879 shares in the company, valued at $4,445,911,452.29. This trade represents a 0.31% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, VP Michael Xie sold 3,546 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, November 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $86.53, for a total value of $306,835.38. Following the completion of the transaction, the vice president owned 10,492,018 shares in the company, valued at $907,874,317.54. This represents a 0.03% decrease in their ownership of the stock. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. 17.20% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Fortinet Company Profile

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.