Zscaler Target of Unusually High Options Trading (NASDAQ:ZS)

Zscaler, Inc. (NASDAQ:ZS) saw some unusual options trading on Thursday. Investors bought 75,749 put options on the company. This represents an increase of approximately 416% compared to the typical volume of 14,689 put options.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of equities research analysts have issued reports on the stock. Berenberg Bank decreased their price target on shares of Zscaler from $400.00 to $390.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Friday, November 28th. Weiss Ratings restated a “sell (d-)” rating on shares of Zscaler in a research note on Wednesday, October 8th. UBS Group dropped their price target on Zscaler from $350.00 to $340.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, November 26th. Cantor Fitzgerald reissued an “overweight” rating on shares of Zscaler in a research report on Wednesday, November 26th. Finally, Citigroup dropped their target price on shares of Zscaler from $365.00 to $350.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Monday, December 1st. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, thirty-three have issued a Buy rating, eight have assigned a Hold rating and one has issued a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $320.13.

Insider Buying and Selling at Zscaler

In other news, insider Adam Geller sold 1,620 shares of Zscaler stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, December 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $232.79, for a total value of $377,119.80. Following the transaction, the insider directly owned 50,528 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $11,762,413.12. This trade represents a 3.11% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, insider Robert Schlossman sold 2,349 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, December 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $232.79, for a total transaction of $546,823.71. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider directly owned 74,653 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $17,378,471.87. This represents a 3.05% decrease in their position. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. Over the last quarter, insiders sold 22,550 shares of company stock worth $5,511,509. 17.20% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Zscaler

Several large investors have recently made changes to their positions in ZS. Alliancebernstein L.P. increased its stake in shares of Zscaler by 0.4% in the 1st quarter. Alliancebernstein L.P. now owns 72,049 shares of the company’s stock valued at $14,296,000 after acquiring an additional 314 shares during the last quarter. Jacobs Levy Equity Management Inc. bought a new stake in Zscaler in the first quarter valued at approximately $3,231,000. Integrated Wealth Concepts LLC raised its holdings in Zscaler by 19.9% in the first quarter. Integrated Wealth Concepts LLC now owns 1,439 shares of the company’s stock worth $285,000 after purchasing an additional 239 shares during the period. NewEdge Advisors LLC raised its holdings in Zscaler by 8.2% in the first quarter. NewEdge Advisors LLC now owns 4,899 shares of the company’s stock worth $972,000 after purchasing an additional 370 shares during the period. Finally, Empowered Funds LLC boosted its position in shares of Zscaler by 9.2% during the first quarter. Empowered Funds LLC now owns 2,811 shares of the company’s stock worth $558,000 after purchasing an additional 238 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 46.45% of the company’s stock.

Zscaler Trading Down 1.6%

ZS stock opened at $216.73 on Friday. Zscaler has a 1-year low of $164.78 and a 1-year high of $336.99. The company has a current ratio of 1.82, a quick ratio of 1.82 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.86. The business’s 50 day moving average is $258.73 and its 200-day moving average is $281.29. The firm has a market cap of $34.56 billion, a P/E ratio of -833.54, a P/E/G ratio of 4,224.62 and a beta of 1.02.

Zscaler (NASDAQ:ZS) last released its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, November 25th. The company reported $0.96 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.85 by $0.11. The firm had revenue of $788.11 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $773.86 million. Zscaler had a negative net margin of 1.45% and a negative return on equity of 0.12%. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 25.5% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the business earned $0.77 earnings per share. Zscaler has set its FY 2026 guidance at 3.780-3.820 EPS and its Q2 2026 guidance at 0.890-0.900 EPS. Equities analysts anticipate that Zscaler will post -0.1 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Zscaler Company Profile

Zscaler is a cloud security company that delivers a cloud-native platform to protect users, applications and data as organizations move away from traditional, network-centric security architectures. The company focuses on a zero trust approach that assumes no implicit trust for users or devices, providing secure access to the internet, SaaS applications and private applications regardless of where users are located. Zscaler positions its services as an alternative to legacy appliances and site-centric VPNs, aiming to simplify security while enabling modern, distributed workforces.

Key offerings are built around the Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange, a multi-tenant cloud platform that enforces security and access policies in-line.