Louisiana State Employees Retirement System Decreases Position in Fortinet, Inc. (NASDAQ:FTNT)

Louisiana State Employees Retirement System lowered its position in Fortinet, Inc. (NASDAQ:FTNT) by 4.0% in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 90,200 shares of the software maker’s stock after selling 3,800 shares during the quarter. Louisiana State Employees Retirement System’s holdings in Fortinet were worth $8,522,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also made changes to their positions in the company. FMR LLC increased its holdings in Fortinet by 276.3% during the 3rd quarter. FMR LLC now owns 3,685,230 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $285,790,000 after acquiring an additional 2,705,767 shares in the last quarter. Los Angeles Capital Management LLC grew its position in shares of Fortinet by 3,155.6% in the third quarter. Los Angeles Capital Management LLC now owns 1,237,244 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $95,948,000 after purchasing an additional 1,199,241 shares during the last quarter. State Street Corp increased its stake in shares of Fortinet by 2.9% during the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 27,281,279 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $2,115,663,000 after purchasing an additional 766,135 shares in the last quarter. Worldquant Millennium Advisors LLC raised its position in shares of Fortinet by 98.9% during the 3rd quarter. Worldquant Millennium Advisors LLC now owns 1,457,858 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $113,057,000 after purchasing an additional 724,887 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Bank of Montreal Can lifted its stake in Fortinet by 27.6% in the 3rd quarter. Bank of Montreal Can now owns 2,584,528 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $200,172,000 after buying an additional 558,807 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 83.71% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of research firms have recently weighed in on FTNT. Wells Fargo & Company boosted their price target on Fortinet from $85.00 to $105.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Friday, February 7th. Bank of America boosted their target price on shares of Fortinet from $87.00 to $104.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, November 19th. Truist Financial reaffirmed a “buy” rating and set a $105.00 price target (up from $85.00) on shares of Fortinet in a research note on Wednesday, November 20th. Stifel Nicolaus boosted their price objective on shares of Fortinet from $103.00 to $115.00 and gave the company a “hold” rating in a research report on Friday, February 7th. Finally, HSBC upgraded shares of Fortinet from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and raised their target price for the stock from $83.00 to $111.00 in a research report on Monday, November 11th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, nineteen have given a hold rating, thirteen have issued a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Fortinet currently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $102.77.

Fortinet Stock Down 1.1 %

Shares of NASDAQ FTNT opened at $108.33 on Wednesday. The stock has a fifty day moving average price of $97.93 and a 200 day moving average price of $85.67. The company has a current ratio of 1.34, a quick ratio of 1.25 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.09. Fortinet, Inc. has a 12-month low of $54.57 and a 12-month high of $110.99. The company has a market cap of $83.03 billion, a P/E ratio of 47.93, a P/E/G ratio of 2.75 and a beta of 1.01.

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, February 6th. The software maker reported $0.67 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.60 by $0.07. Fortinet had a return on equity of 463.85% and a net margin of 29.30%. Research analysts anticipate that Fortinet, Inc. will post 2.05 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Activity

In other Fortinet news, Director William H. Neukom bought 355 shares of Fortinet stock in a transaction dated Friday, December 6th. The stock was bought at an average cost of $98.50 per share, for a total transaction of $34,967.50. Following the purchase, the director now owns 150,245 shares in the company, valued at $14,799,132.50. This represents a 0.24 % increase in their position. The purchase was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, CEO Ken Xie sold 23,044 shares of Fortinet stock in a transaction on Wednesday, January 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $93.32, for a total transaction of $2,150,466.08. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 49,039,698 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $4,576,384,617.36. This trade represents a 0.05 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 67,860 shares of company stock worth $6,469,056 over the last 90 days. Company insiders own 18.00% of the company’s stock.

Fortinet 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.