King Luther Capital Management Corp Sells 31,588 Shares of Fortinet, Inc. $FTNT

King Luther Capital Management Corp lowered its position in shares of Fortinet, Inc. (NASDAQ:FTNT) by 4.1% during the 3rd quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 744,619 shares of the software maker’s stock after selling 31,588 shares during the quarter. King Luther Capital Management Corp owned 0.10% of Fortinet worth $133,108,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other large investors have also made changes to their positions in FTNT. BlackRock Inc. purchased a new stake in Fortinet during the 2nd quarter valued at approximately $9,561,650,000. First Trust Advisors LP lifted its holdings in shares of Fortinet by 45.5% in the first quarter. First Trust Advisors LP now owns 11,506,173 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $940,284,000 after buying an additional 3,598,487 shares in the last quarter. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership boosted its position in shares of Fortinet by 87.4% during the first quarter. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership now owns 9,651,024 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $788,682,000 after acquiring an additional 4,500,194 shares during the last quarter. Bank of New York Mellon Corp bought a new position in shares of Fortinet during the second quarter worth $1,432,842,000. Finally, Legal & General Group Plc bought a new position in shares of Fortinet during the second quarter worth $979,062,000. 83.71% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, VP Michael Xie sold 3,121 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, November 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $129.49, for a total value of $404,138.29. Following the sale, the vice president owned 9,918,360 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,284,328,436.40. This represents a 0.03% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. The sale was made to cover tax withholding obligations related to the vesting of equity awards. Also, COO John Whittle sold 53,865 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, September 14th. The shares were sold at an average price of $165.44, for a total transaction of $8,911,425.60. Following the completion of the sale, the chief operating officer directly owned 96,987 shares in the company, valued at approximately $16,045,529.28. This represents a 35.71% decrease in their position. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Insiders sold 221,304 shares of company stock valued at $30,675,309 over the last three months. 17.60% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Fortinet Trading Up 3.7%

Shares of FTNT stock opened at $128.10 on Thursday. Fortinet, Inc. has a 1 year low of $73.55 and a 1 year high of $197.13. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.22, a current ratio of 1.40 and a quick ratio of 1.28. The stock’s 50 day simple moving average is $165.56 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $130.19. The company has a market cap of $94.12 billion, a PE ratio of 41.59, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.37 and a beta of 1.04.

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, October 28th. The software maker reported $0.91 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.86 by $0.05. Fortinet had a return on equity of 152.72% and a net margin of 28.96%. The business had revenue of $2.08 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.06 billion. During the same period last year, the company earned $0.74 EPS. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 20.5% on a year-over-year basis. Research analysts predict that Fortinet, Inc. will post 3.21 earnings per share for the current year.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of equities research analysts recently commented on FTNT shares. Deutsche Bank reiterated a “hold” rating and issued a $130.00 target price on shares of Fortinet in a research report on Thursday, October 29th. Rosenblatt Securities cut their target price on shares of Fortinet from $195.00 to $175.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, October 29th. Guggenheim restated a “buy” rating on shares of Fortinet in a research report on Thursday, October 29th. Royal Bank Of Canada set a $165.00 price target on shares of Fortinet and gave the company a “sector perform” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 29th. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group reaffirmed a “buy” rating and set a $190.00 price target (up from $116.00) on shares of Fortinet in a research note on Thursday, July 30th. Eleven research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, twenty-four have assigned a Hold rating and six have assigned a Sell rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $150.44.

About Fortinet

Fortinet, Inc. is a cybersecurity and networking company that provides products and services to help organizations protect their networks, devices, applications, and cloud environments. Its offerings include FortiGate next-generation firewalls, the FortiOS operating system, and security, endpoint, cloud, and secure access service edge (SASE) solutions. The company’s Security Fabric platform is designed to integrate security and networking products and support centralized visibility and management.