What to Expect From Palo Alto Earnings

By Chris Lange Published May 27, 12:15PM EDT

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Palo Alto Networks Inc. (NYSE: PANW) will report its fiscal third-quarter financial results after the markets close Wednesday. Thomson Reuters has consensus estimates of $0.20 in earnings per share (EPS) on $223.22 million in revenue. In the quarter of the previous year, the company posted EPS of $0.11 and $150.70 million in revenue.

This company has been a momentum trader’s dream over the past year and continues to show up well with resellers. It was reported to have the highest percentage share in the highly competitive firewall bake-offs at 42%. The company also ranked highest with the Wildfire product, which was the favorite in the advanced persistent threat (APT) space among the value-added resellers with 43%.

The company is helping to lead a new era in cybersecurity by protecting thousands of enterprise, government and service provider networks from cyberthreats, and it boasted a staggering year-over-year billing growth. Unlike fragmented legacy products, its security platform safely enables business operations and delivers protection based on what matters most in today’s dynamic computing environments: applications, users and content.

According to a recent report from Oppenheimer, Palo Alto is benefiting from strong customer growth and adoption. The Oppenheimer analyst also called the company a disruptor within the network security space and expects that it to continue to gain market share. The report said:

Given its platform approach, Palo Alto can also combine multiple security functions (firewall, IPS, web filtering, etc.) into a unified solution that improves efficiency and total cost of ownership for customers. With cost pressures fueling demand for more integrated security platform, we continue to view Palo Alto as a key beneficiary of a broad shift toward more platform-based security operations.

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Oppenheimer has a $175 price target for Palo Alto, more than $10 higher than the current price and nearly $10 higher than the consensus analyst price target.

Shares of Palo Alto were down 0.9% at $162.38 on Wednesday midday. The stock has a consensus price target of $167.17 and a 52-week trading range of $68.03 to $165.09.

About the Author Chris Lange →

Chris Lange is a writer for 24/7 Wall St., based in Houston. He has covered financial markets over the past decade with an emphasis on healthcare, tech, and IPOs. During this time, he has published thousands of articles with insightful analysis across these complex fields. Currently, Lange's focus is on military and geopolitical topics.

Lange's work has been quoted or mentioned in Forbes, The New York Times, Business Insider, USA Today, MSN, Yahoo, The Verge, Vice, The Intelligencer, Quartz, Nasdaq, The Motley Fool, Fox Business, International Business Times, The Street, Seeking Alpha, Barron’s, Benzinga, and many other major publications.

A graduate of Southwestern University in Georgetown, Texas, Lange majored in business with a particular focus on investments. He has previous experience in the banking industry and startups.