Palo Alto Networks (NASDAQ:PANW) Stock Bumped Up to “Strong-Buy” by Citigroup

Posted by Brenda Bartman on Oct 16th, 2026

Citigroup upgraded shares of Palo Alto Networks (NASDAQ:PANW – Free Report) from a hold rating to a strong-buy rating in a research report sent to investors on Thursday morning,Zacks reports.

A number of other research analysts have also recently commented on the company. Tigress Financial raised their target price on Palo Alto Networks from $245.00 to $430.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, July 15th. Wedbush started coverage on Palo Alto Networks in a research report on Friday, September 11th. They set an “outperform” rating and a $400.00 price target on the stock. Stephens set a $400.00 price target on Palo Alto Networks and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, September 2nd. Sanford C. Bernstein cut Palo Alto Networks from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating and upped their price target for the stock from $253.00 to $351.00 in a research note on Thursday, September 17th. Finally, FBN Securities reiterated an “outperform” rating on shares of Palo Alto Networks in a report on Wednesday, July 1st. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, thirty-eight have issued a Buy rating and eleven have given a Hold rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $393.02.

View Our Latest Research Report on Palo Alto Networks

Palo Alto Networks Price Performance

Shares of NASDAQ PANW opened at $370.27 on Thursday. Palo Alto Networks has a 1 year low of $139.57 and a 1 year high of $432.33. The stock has a market capitalization of $302.88 billion, a P/E ratio of 726.03, a P/E/G ratio of 10.79 and a beta of 0.93. The company’s 50-day moving average is $373.10 and its 200 day moving average is $300.73. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.06, a current ratio of 0.87 and a quick ratio of 0.87.

Palo Alto Networks (NASDAQ:PANW – Get Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, September 1st. The network technology company reported $1.02 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.98 by $0.04. The business had revenue of $3.41 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $3.35 billion. Palo Alto Networks had a net margin of 2.67% and a return on equity of 8.50%. Palo Alto Networks’s quarterly revenue was up 34.5% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the business posted $0.95 earnings per share. Palo Alto Networks has set its FY 2027 guidance at 4.160-4.190 EPS and its Q1 2027 guidance at 0.960-0.980 EPS. On average, sell-side analysts expect that Palo Alto Networks will post 2.31 earnings per share for the current year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Palo Alto Networks news, Director John P. Key sold 2,500 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, September 14th. The shares were sold at an average price of $376.03, for a total transaction of $940,075.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director owned 10,000 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,760,300. This trade represents a 20.00% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this link. Also, CAO Josh Paul sold 400 shares of Palo Alto Networks stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, October 1st. The shares were sold at an average price of $395.70, for a total transaction of $158,280.00. Following the transaction, the chief accounting officer owned 77,987 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $30,859,455.90. The trade was a 0.51% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. In the last quarter, insiders have sold 54,210 shares of company stock valued at $20,823,029. Insiders own 1.40% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. BlackRock Inc. purchased a new position in Palo Alto Networks during the second quarter valued at $25,833,462,000. Legal & General Group Plc purchased a new stake in shares of Palo Alto Networks in the second quarter worth $1,968,304,000. Bank of New York Mellon Corp purchased a new stake in shares of Palo Alto Networks in the second quarter worth $1,569,755,000. Deutsche Bank AG purchased a new stake in shares of Palo Alto Networks in the second quarter worth $1,481,236,000. Finally, Bank of America Corp DE increased its holdings in shares of Palo Alto Networks by 16.0% during the first quarter. Bank of America Corp DE now owns 22,476,753 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $3,603,473,000 after acquiring an additional 3,101,267 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 79.82% of the company’s stock.

Palo Alto Networks Company Profile

(Get Free Report)

Palo Alto Networks, Inc is a cybersecurity company that provides solutions designed to help organizations protect networks, endpoints, cloud environments, applications and users from cyber threats. Its offerings include next-generation firewalls, cloud-delivered security services, secure access service edge (SASE) solutions, endpoint protection and security operations tools.

The company also provides platforms and services for cloud security, threat intelligence, incident response, vulnerability management and the automation of security operations.