Palo Alto Networks (NASDAQ:PANW) Trading 4% Higher Following Analyst Upgrade

Palo Alto Networks, Inc. (NASDAQ:PANW) was up 4% on Tuesday after Wells Fargo & Company upgraded the stock to a strong-buy rating. The stock traded as high as $156.83 and last traded at $156.09. Approximately 10,256,072 shares changed hands during trading, a decline of 13% from the average daily volume of 11,782,269 shares. The stock had previously closed at $150.15.

PANW has been the topic of a number of other reports. Stifel Nicolaus dropped their price target on Palo Alto Networks from $200.00 to $185.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, February 18th. Jefferies Financial Group reissued a “buy” rating on shares of Palo Alto Networks in a report on Wednesday, February 4th. Sanford C. Bernstein set a $209.00 target price on shares of Palo Alto Networks and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, February 18th. Susquehanna reduced their price target on shares of Palo Alto Networks from $230.00 to $200.00 and set a “positive” rating on the stock in a report on Wednesday, February 18th. Finally, Weiss Ratings reissued a “hold (c)” rating on shares of Palo Alto Networks in a report on Monday, December 29th. Two analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, thirty-four have assigned a Buy rating and nine have issued a Hold rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $210.19.

Insider Buying and Selling at Palo Alto Networks

In other Palo Alto Networks news, CAO Josh D. Paul sold 800 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, January 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $184.81, for a total transaction of $147,848.00. Following the sale, the chief accounting officer directly owned 46,005 shares in the company, valued at $8,502,184.05. This represents a 1.71% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, EVP Dipak Golechha sold 5,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, December 23rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $188.18, for a total value of $940,900.00. Following the completion of the sale, the executive vice president directly owned 155,119 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $29,190,293.42. The trade was a 3.12% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. Insiders have sold a total of 139,068 shares of company stock valued at $26,600,684 over the last quarter. 1.40% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Trading of Palo Alto Networks

Institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its stake in shares of Palo Alto Networks by 4.1% during the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 67,929,063 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $12,512,533,000 after purchasing an additional 2,659,100 shares during the period. State Street Corp lifted its stake in Palo Alto Networks by 2.0% in the fourth quarter. State Street Corp now owns 30,331,705 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $5,587,100,000 after purchasing an additional 594,789 shares during the last quarter. Bank of America Corp DE boosted its position in shares of Palo Alto Networks by 11.9% during the fourth quarter. Bank of America Corp DE now owns 19,375,486 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $3,568,964,000 after buying an additional 2,065,776 shares during the period. Geode Capital Management LLC grew its stake in shares of Palo Alto Networks by 3.5% during the fourth quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 15,989,257 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $2,934,935,000 after buying an additional 540,756 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Norges Bank bought a new position in shares of Palo Alto Networks during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $1,415,364,000. 79.82% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Palo Alto Networks Price Performance

The stock has a market capitalization of $129.38 billion, a PE ratio of 87.60, a P/E/G ratio of 5.64 and a beta of 0.78. The firm has a fifty day moving average price of $172.60 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $190.35.

Palo Alto Networks (NASDAQ:PANW) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, February 17th. The network technology company reported $1.03 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.94 by $0.09. Palo Alto Networks had a return on equity of 17.60% and a net margin of 12.96%.The company had revenue of $2.59 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.58 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company posted $0.81 EPS. Palo Alto Networks’s quarterly revenue was up 14.9% on a year-over-year basis. Palo Alto Networks has set its FY 2026 guidance at 3.650-3.700 EPS and its Q3 2026 guidance at 0.780-0.800 EPS. On average, research analysts expect that Palo Alto Networks, Inc. will post 1.76 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

About Palo Alto Networks

Palo Alto Networks (NASDAQ: PANW) is a cybersecurity company founded in 2005 and headquartered in Santa Clara, California. The firm develops a broad suite of security products and services designed to prevent successful cyberattacks and protect enterprise networks, clouds, and endpoints. Built around a platform strategy, its offerings target threat prevention, detection, response and governance across hybrid and multi-cloud environments.

The company’s product portfolio includes next‑generation firewalls as a core on‑premises capability, alongside cloud‑delivered security services and software for securing public and private clouds.