Palo Alto Networks (NASDAQ:PANW) Director Sells $102,099.40 in Stock

Palo Alto Networks, Inc. (NASDAQ:PANW) Director Aparna Bawa sold 260 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, September 24th. The shares were sold at an average price of $392.69, for a total transaction of $102,099.40. Following the completion of the transaction, the director owned 4,677 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,836,611.13. This represents a 5.27% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website.

Aparna Bawa also recently made the following trade(s):

• On Tuesday, September 15th, Aparna Bawa sold 500 shares of Palo Alto Networks stock. The stock was sold at an average price of $377.18, for a total transaction of $188,590.00.
• On Monday, September 14th, Aparna Bawa sold 1,000 shares of Palo Alto Networks stock. The shares were sold at an average price of $373.61, for a total transaction of $373,610.00.
• On Wednesday, July 1st, Aparna Bawa sold 290 shares of Palo Alto Networks stock. The shares were sold at an average price of $348.74, for a total transaction of $101,134.60.

Palo Alto Networks Stock Up 4.6%

Shares of NASDAQ PANW traded up $17.35 during mid-day trading on Monday, reaching $392.09. The company had a trading volume of 5,988,905 shares, compared to its average volume of 8,412,000. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.06, a quick ratio of 0.87 and a current ratio of 0.87. Palo Alto Networks, Inc. has a twelve month low of $139.57 and a twelve month high of $398.88. The stock’s 50 day moving average is $356.02 and its 200-day moving average is $277.55. The stock has a market capitalization of $320.73 billion, a PE ratio of 768.82, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 10.79 and a beta of 0.91.

Palo Alto Networks (NASDAQ:PANW) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, September 1st. The network technology company reported $1.02 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.98 by $0.04. Palo Alto Networks had a return on equity of 8.50% and a net margin of 2.67%.The firm had revenue of $3.41 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $3.35 billion. During the same quarter last year, the firm earned $0.95 earnings per share. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 34.5% on a year-over-year basis. Palo Alto Networks has set its FY 2027 guidance at 4.160-4.190 EPS and its Q1 2027 guidance at 0.960-0.980 EPS. As a group, equities analysts anticipate that Palo Alto Networks, Inc. will post 2.31 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Palo Alto Networks

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the business. BlackRock Inc. acquired a new position in shares of Palo Alto Networks during the 2nd quarter worth about $25,833,462,000. State Street Corp grew its holdings in Palo Alto Networks by 4.2% in the 2nd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 36,979,497 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $12,610,748,000 after buying an additional 1,493,179 shares during the last quarter. Bank of America Corp DE grew its holdings in Palo Alto Networks by 0.9% in the 2nd quarter. Bank of America Corp DE now owns 22,681,876 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $7,734,973,000 after buying an additional 205,123 shares during the last quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC increased its position in Palo Alto Networks by 8.7% in the 2nd quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC now owns 8,778,963 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $2,993,802,000 after buying an additional 706,003 shares during the period. Finally, Norges Bank bought a new position in Palo Alto Networks in the 4th quarter worth approximately $1,415,364,000. 79.82% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several brokerages recently weighed in on PANW. Rosenblatt Securities raised their price objective on shares of Palo Alto Networks from $355.00 to $415.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, September 2nd. BNP Paribas Exane raised their price target on shares of Palo Alto Networks from $380.00 to $400.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, September 2nd. Stephens set a $400.00 price objective on shares of Palo Alto Networks and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Wednesday, September 2nd. Needham & Company LLC restated a “buy” rating and set a $425.00 target price on shares of Palo Alto Networks in a report on Wednesday, September 2nd. Finally, Phillip Securities downgraded Palo Alto Networks from a “moderate buy” rating to a “hold” rating and upped their price target for the stock from $320.00 to $346.00 in a research note on Monday, September 7th. Thirty-eight equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and twelve have given a Hold rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Palo Alto Networks currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $390.47.

Palo Alto Networks Company Profile

Palo Alto Networks, Inc is a cybersecurity company that provides solutions designed to help organizations protect networks, endpoints, cloud environments, applications and users from cyber threats. Its offerings include next-generation firewalls, cloud-delivered security services, secure access service edge (SASE) solutions, endpoint protection and security operations tools.

The company also provides platforms and services for cloud security, threat intelligence, incident response, vulnerability management and the automation of security operations.