B. Metzler seel. Sohn & Co. AG Increases Stock Holdings in Fortinet, Inc. (NASDAQ:FTNT)

B. Metzler seel. Sohn & Co. AG grew its holdings in Fortinet, Inc. (NASDAQ:FTNT) by 4.9% in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 27,349 shares of the software maker’s stock after acquiring an additional 1,283 shares during the quarter. B. Metzler seel. Sohn & Co. AG’s holdings in Fortinet were worth $2,585,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other large investors have also modified their holdings of FTNT. Summit Financial LLC grew its position in Fortinet by 55.5% during the 4th quarter. Summit Financial LLC now owns 6,821 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $644,000 after purchasing an additional 2,434 shares during the last quarter. Edmond DE Rothschild Holding S.A. purchased a new stake in shares of Fortinet during the fourth quarter valued at $27,000. O Shaughnessy Asset Management LLC raised its stake in Fortinet by 19.0% in the 4th quarter. O Shaughnessy Asset Management LLC now owns 64,481 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $6,092,000 after acquiring an additional 10,291 shares during the last quarter. CIBC Private Wealth Group LLC lifted its position in Fortinet by 1.3% during the 4th quarter. CIBC Private Wealth Group LLC now owns 9,390 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $902,000 after acquiring an additional 116 shares during the period. Finally, California Public Employees Retirement System grew its stake in Fortinet by 57.2% during the 4th quarter. California Public Employees Retirement System now owns 1,743,571 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $164,733,000 after purchasing an additional 634,455 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 83.71% of the company’s stock.

Fortinet Stock Performance

NASDAQ:FTNT opened at $96.67 on Wednesday. The company’s 50-day moving average is $103.00 and its two-hundred day moving average is $93.68. The firm has a market capitalization of $74.34 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 42.77, a PEG ratio of 4.19 and a beta of 0.97. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.67, a current ratio of 1.47 and a quick ratio of 1.39. Fortinet, Inc. has a 1-year low of $54.57 and a 1-year high of $114.82.

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, February 6th. The software maker reported $0.67 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.60 by $0.07. Fortinet had a return on equity of 256.53% and a net margin of 29.30%. Analysts forecast that Fortinet, Inc. will post 2.09 EPS for the current year.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of equities research analysts recently commented on FTNT shares. Royal Bank of Canada upped their target price on Fortinet from $97.00 to $115.00 and gave the company a “sector perform” rating in a research report on Friday, February 7th. KeyCorp raised shares of Fortinet from a “sector weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and set a $115.00 target price for the company in a report on Thursday, December 19th. Rosenblatt Securities upped their price target on shares of Fortinet from $115.00 to $125.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, February 7th. StockNews.com lowered Fortinet from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Tuesday. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group raised their target price on Fortinet from $114.00 to $130.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, February 7th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, twenty-one have issued a hold rating, eleven have given a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $105.77.

Insider Buying and Selling at Fortinet

In other news, CFO Keith Jensen sold 23,500 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, February 19th. The stock was sold at an average price of $113.56, for a total transaction of $2,668,660.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer now directly owns 4,736 shares in the company, valued at $537,820.16. This trade represents a 83.23 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Also, VP Michael Xie sold 326,784 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, March 11th. The shares were sold at an average price of $98.17, for a total value of $32,080,385.28. Following the completion of the sale, the vice president now owns 11,000,068 shares in the company, valued at $1,079,876,675.56. This represents a 2.89 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 599,988 shares of company stock worth $59,094,530 over the last three months. Insiders own 18.00% of the company’s stock.

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.