Insider Selling: Palo Alto Networks, Inc. (NASDAQ:PANW) EVP Sells 120,774 Shares of Stock

Palo Alto Networks, Inc. (NASDAQ:PANW) EVP Lee Klarich sold 120,774 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, April 7th. The stock was sold at an average price of $151.13, for a total value of $18,252,574.62. Following the sale, the executive vice president now owns 321,774 shares in the company, valued at $48,629,704.62. The trade was a 27.29 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through this link.

Lee Klarich also recently made the following trade(s):

• On Monday, February 3rd, Lee Klarich sold 99,707 shares of Palo Alto Networks stock. The stock was sold at an average price of $182.45, for a total transaction of $18,191,542.15.

Palo Alto Networks Stock Performance

PANW stock opened at $168.27 on Friday. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of $182.59 and a 200 day simple moving average of $184.81. Palo Alto Networks, Inc. has a 52 week low of $135.18 and a 52 week high of $208.39. The stock has a market cap of $111.41 billion, a P/E ratio of 94.80, a P/E/G ratio of 5.64 and a beta of 1.07.

Palo Alto Networks (NASDAQ:PANW) last released its earnings results on Thursday, February 13th. The network technology company reported $0.81 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.75 by $0.06. Palo Alto Networks had a net margin of 14.64% and a return on equity of 21.93%. The company had revenue of $2.26 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.24 billion. Sell-side analysts predict that Palo Alto Networks, Inc. will post 1.76 EPS for the current year.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Institutional investors and hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the company. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Palo Alto Networks by 104.4% during the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 61,233,907 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $11,142,122,000 after buying an additional 31,281,359 shares during the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC lifted its stake in Palo Alto Networks by 87.8% in the fourth quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 14,382,116 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $2,611,013,000 after acquiring an additional 6,725,148 shares during the last quarter. Norges Bank bought a new stake in Palo Alto Networks in the fourth quarter worth approximately $970,736,000. Northern Trust Corp increased its stake in shares of Palo Alto Networks by 133.7% during the 4th quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 7,842,647 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $1,427,048,000 after purchasing an additional 4,486,654 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Capital Research Global Investors raised its holdings in shares of Palo Alto Networks by 83.8% during the 4th quarter. Capital Research Global Investors now owns 8,427,062 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $1,533,419,000 after purchasing an additional 3,841,359 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 79.82% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

PANW has been the subject of a number of recent analyst reports. Barclays decreased their price objective on Palo Alto Networks from $425.00 to $213.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Tuesday, December 17th. Guggenheim lowered Palo Alto Networks from a “neutral” rating to a “sell” rating and set a $130.00 price target on the stock. in a report on Monday, January 6th. HSBC raised shares of Palo Alto Networks from a “reduce” rating to a “hold” rating and set a $156.00 price objective for the company in a report on Thursday. UBS Group raised their target price on shares of Palo Alto Networks from $190.00 to $200.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Friday, February 14th. Finally, StockNews.com lowered shares of Palo Alto Networks from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Tuesday, December 24th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, twelve have assigned a hold rating, twenty-eight have given a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $204.52.

Palo Alto Networks Company Profile

Palo Alto Networks, Inc provides cybersecurity solutions worldwide. The company offers firewall appliances and software; and Panorama, a security management solution for the global control of network security platform as a virtual or a physical appliance. It also provides subscription services covering the areas of threat prevention, malware and persistent threat, URL filtering, laptop and mobile device protection, DNS security, Internet of Things security, SaaS security API, and SaaS security inline, as well as threat intelligence, and data loss prevention.