Gen Digital Inc. $GEN Shares Purchased by First Trust Advisors LP

First Trust Advisors LP increased its stake in shares of Gen Digital Inc. (NASDAQ:GEN) by 2.5% during the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 16,301,095 shares of the company’s stock after buying an additional 401,937 shares during the quarter. First Trust Advisors LP owned about 2.65% of Gen Digital worth $462,788,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in GEN. Choreo LLC increased its stake in Gen Digital by 3.2% during the second quarter. Choreo LLC now owns 10,116 shares of the company’s stock worth $297,000 after acquiring an additional 315 shares during the last quarter. Beacon Pointe Advisors LLC lifted its stake in shares of Gen Digital by 3.9% in the 2nd quarter. Beacon Pointe Advisors LLC now owns 9,505 shares of the company’s stock valued at $279,000 after purchasing an additional 357 shares during the last quarter. Clearstead Advisors LLC lifted its stake in shares of Gen Digital by 48.6% in the 3rd quarter. Clearstead Advisors LLC now owns 1,223 shares of the company’s stock valued at $35,000 after purchasing an additional 400 shares during the last quarter. CX Institutional grew its holdings in shares of Gen Digital by 0.9% during the 3rd quarter. CX Institutional now owns 55,971 shares of the company’s stock worth $1,589,000 after purchasing an additional 478 shares during the period. Finally, Amalgamated Bank increased its position in shares of Gen Digital by 0.5% during the 3rd quarter. Amalgamated Bank now owns 108,378 shares of the company’s stock worth $3,077,000 after purchasing an additional 487 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 81.38% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of research firms have recently issued reports on GEN. Zacks Research raised shares of Gen Digital from a “strong sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Wednesday, February 18th. Royal Bank Of Canada lowered their price objective on shares of Gen Digital from $33.00 to $29.00 and set a “sector perform” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, November 7th. Evercore lifted their target price on shares of Gen Digital from $35.00 to $37.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Friday, November 7th. Wall Street Zen raised Gen Digital from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Sunday, February 8th. Finally, Barclays lowered their price target on Gen Digital from $33.00 to $32.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, February 6th. Two analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and seven have issued a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, Gen Digital presently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $32.71.

Gen Digital Price Performance

Shares of NASDAQ GEN opened at $22.61 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 3.50, a current ratio of 0.47 and a quick ratio of 0.47. The company has a market cap of $13.69 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 23.31, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.75 and a beta of 1.11. The stock’s 50-day moving average is $24.50 and its two-hundred day moving average is $26.66. Gen Digital Inc. has a 1-year low of $21.33 and a 1-year high of $32.22.

Gen Digital (NASDAQ:GEN) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, February 5th. The company reported $0.64 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.63 by $0.01. Gen Digital had a return on equity of 56.76% and a net margin of 12.76%.The business had revenue of $1.24 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.23 billion. During the same quarter last year, the business posted $0.56 EPS. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 25.8% compared to the same quarter last year. Gen Digital has set its Q4 2026 guidance at 0.640-0.660 EPS and its FY 2026 guidance at 2.540-2.560 EPS. Analysts forecast that Gen Digital Inc. will post 2.05 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Gen Digital Dividend Announcement

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, March 11th. Shareholders of record on Monday, February 16th will be issued a dividend of $0.125 per share. This represents a $0.50 annualized dividend and a yield of 2.2%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, February 13th. Gen Digital’s payout ratio is 51.55%.

Insider Activity at Gen Digital

In other Gen Digital news, Director Ondrej Vlcek sold 113,674 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, December 10th. The shares were sold at an average price of $27.12, for a total value of $3,082,838.88. Following the sale, the director directly owned 3,932,980 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $106,662,417.60. This represents a 2.81% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this link. Corporate insiders own 9.30% of the company’s stock.

About Gen Digital

Gen Digital (NASDAQ: GEN) is a global cybersecurity company specializing in consumer- and small-business-focused security, privacy, and identity protection solutions. The company offers a suite of products designed to safeguard devices, networks, and personal information against malware, ransomware, phishing attacks and other digital threats. With a focus on user-friendly interfaces and cross-platform compatibility, Gen Digital develops antivirus software, VPN services, parental controls, password management tools, and comprehensive identity-theft monitoring services.

Gen Digital traces its origins to the consumer software division of Symantec Corporation, which was spun off in late 2019 under the NortonLifeLock name.