Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. $CHKP Shares Sold by New York State Common Retirement Fund

New York State Common Retirement Fund cut its position in Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. (NASDAQ:CHKP) by 9.2% in the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 147,300 shares of the technology company’s stock after selling 14,962 shares during the quarter. New York State Common Retirement Fund owned approximately 0.13% of Check Point Software Technologies worth $30,478,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other institutional investors also recently added to or reduced their stakes in CHKP. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA boosted its holdings in shares of Check Point Software Technologies by 27.1% in the third quarter. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA now owns 6,170,455 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $1,276,729,000 after acquiring an additional 1,317,167 shares during the period. Norges Bank purchased a new stake in Check Point Software Technologies in the 2nd quarter valued at $714,801,000. Ninety One UK Ltd boosted its stake in Check Point Software Technologies by 0.3% during the 3rd quarter. Ninety One UK Ltd now owns 2,601,592 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $538,295,000 after purchasing an additional 8,814 shares during the period. Ameriprise Financial Inc. grew its position in Check Point Software Technologies by 9.3% during the 2nd quarter. Ameriprise Financial Inc. now owns 2,001,247 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $442,733,000 after purchasing an additional 170,373 shares during the last quarter. Finally, First Trust Advisors LP increased its stake in Check Point Software Technologies by 9.6% in the second quarter. First Trust Advisors LP now owns 1,899,862 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $420,344,000 after purchasing an additional 166,092 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 98.51% of the company’s stock.

Check Point Software Technologies Trading Up 0.7%

Shares of Check Point Software Technologies stock opened at $179.51 on Friday. The company has a 50-day moving average of $187.10 and a two-hundred day moving average of $193.67. Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. has a 12-month low of $173.56 and a 12-month high of $234.35. The stock has a market cap of $19.74 billion, a PE ratio of 19.66, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.86 and a beta of 0.59.

Check Point Software Technologies (NASDAQ:CHKP) last posted its earnings results on Tuesday, October 28th. The technology company reported $3.94 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.45 by $1.49. Check Point Software Technologies had a return on equity of 37.91% and a net margin of 37.62%.The company had revenue of $677.50 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $673.60 million. During the same period in the previous year, the business earned $2.25 earnings per share. Check Point Software Technologies’s quarterly revenue was up 6.7% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, sell-side analysts forecast that Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. will post 8.61 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several equities research analysts have recently weighed in on the stock. Citigroup decreased their target price on shares of Check Point Software Technologies from $210.00 to $200.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Tuesday, January 13th. UBS Group increased their price objective on Check Point Software Technologies from $210.00 to $215.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 29th. Morgan Stanley set a $197.00 target price on Check Point Software Technologies in a report on Wednesday. Roth Mkm reaffirmed a “neutral” rating on shares of Check Point Software Technologies in a report on Monday, October 27th. Finally, BMO Capital Markets lifted their price objective on shares of Check Point Software Technologies from $215.00 to $240.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 29th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, nine have given a Buy rating and twelve have issued a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $226.62.

About Check Point Software Technologies

Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. is an Israeli-founded cybersecurity company that develops, markets and supports a broad portfolio of network, cloud and endpoint security products. Founded in 1993, the company was an early pioneer of stateful inspection firewall technology and later developed a modular “software blade” approach that allowed customers to combine protection capabilities. Check Point’s product set spans physical and virtual security appliances, software and cloud-native services designed to prevent cyberattacks, protect data and simplify security management for enterprises and service providers.

Key product families include Quantum Security Gateways (on-premises and hybrid appliances), CloudGuard (cloud security posture and workload protection), Harmony (endpoint, remote access and unified endpoint security), and SandBlast (advanced threat prevention and sandboxing).