Fortinet, Inc. (FTNT) Short Interest Down 25.9% in July

Fortinet, Inc. (NASDAQ:FTNT) saw a significant drop in short interest in July. As of July 31st, there was short interest totalling 3,958,207 shares, a drop of 25.9% from the July 14th total of 5,340,107 shares. Approximately 2.7% of the company’s stock are short sold. Based on an average daily volume of 2,028,938 shares, the days-to-cover ratio is currently 2.0 days.

FTNT has been the topic of a number of recent research reports. ValuEngine lowered Fortinet from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a report on Friday, July 28th. Susquehanna Bancshares Inc initiated coverage on Fortinet in a report on Wednesday, June 7th. They issued a “neutral” rating and a $45.00 target price on the stock. BMO Capital Markets upgraded Fortinet from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and raised their target price for the company from $44.00 to $46.00 in a report on Friday, April 21st. They noted that the move was a valuation call. Dougherty & Co raised their target price on Fortinet from $38.00 to $46.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, April 21st. Finally, Northland Securities initiated coverage on Fortinet in a report on Thursday, June 29th. They issued an “outperform” rating and a $45.00 target price on the stock. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have assigned a hold rating, twenty have assigned a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company. The company presently has a consensus rating of “Buy” and a consensus target price of $41.56.

In other news, insider Keith Jensen sold 624 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, May 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $40.73, for a total value of $25,415.52. Following the transaction, the insider now owns 978 shares in the company, valued at $39,833.94. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, Director Ming Hsieh sold 4,743 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, June 8th. The shares were sold at an average price of $39.29, for a total value of $186,352.47. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 14,258 shares of company stock worth $535,475 in the last 90 days. Corporate insiders own 17.00% of the company’s stock.

Institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the company. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP boosted its position in shares of Fortinet by 23.7% in the fourth quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 255,393 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $7,693,000 after buying an additional 48,851 shares in the last quarter. Teachers Advisors LLC boosted its position in shares of Fortinet by 440.2% in the fourth quarter. Teachers Advisors LLC now owns 656,181 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $19,764,000 after buying an additional 534,706 shares in the last quarter. Gulf International Bank UK Ltd boosted its position in shares of Fortinet by 0.7% in the first quarter. Gulf International Bank UK Ltd now owns 44,764 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $1,716,000 after buying an additional 300 shares in the last quarter. Capstone Asset Management Co. boosted its position in shares of Fortinet by 4.1% in the first quarter. Capstone Asset Management Co. now owns 13,392 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $514,000 after buying an additional 530 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Juncture Wealth Strategies LLC boosted its position in shares of Fortinet by 11.4% in the first quarter. Juncture Wealth Strategies LLC now owns 14,161 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $543,000 after buying an additional 1,451 shares in the last quarter. 71.41% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Fortinet (FTNT) opened at 37.05 on Tuesday. Fortinet has a 12 month low of $28.50 and a 12 month high of $41.56. The stock has a 50 day moving average price of $38.31 and a 200 day moving average price of $38.01. The stock has a market capitalization of $6.51 billion, a PE ratio of 101.51 and a beta of 1.02.

Fortinet (NASDAQ:FTNT) last announced its earnings results on Wednesday, July 26th. The software maker reported $0.27 EPS for the quarter, topping the Zacks’ consensus estimate of $0.20 by $0.07. Fortinet had a return on equity of 9.36% and a net margin of 4.71%. The company had revenue of $363.50 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $361.05 million. During the same period last year, the firm earned $0.14 EPS. Fortinet’s revenue for the quarter was up 16.7% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, equities research analysts forecast that Fortinet will post $0.95 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Fortinet declared that its Board of Directors has approved a share buyback program on Wednesday, July 26th that authorizes the company to repurchase $300.00 million in outstanding shares. This repurchase authorization authorizes the software maker to repurchase up to 4.2% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase programs are generally an indication that the company’s board believes its shares are undervalued.

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About Fortinet

Fortinet, Inc is a network security company. The Company provides cyber security solutions to a range of enterprises, service providers and government organizations across the world. Its network security solution consists of FortiGate physical, virtual machine and cloud platforms, which provide integrated security and networking functions to protect data, applications and users from network-and content-level security threats.