HighTower Advisors LLC Cuts Stake in Okta, Inc. $OKTA

HighTower Advisors LLC lowered its position in Okta, Inc. (NASDAQ:OKTA) by 98.2% in the third quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The firm owned 67,901 shares of the company’s stock after selling 3,642,667 shares during the quarter. HighTower Advisors LLC’s holdings in Okta were worth $6,226,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds have also made changes to their positions in OKTA. Root Financial Partners LLC purchased a new stake in Okta during the third quarter worth about $26,000. Promus Capital LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Okta during the 2nd quarter valued at approximately $27,000. Cullen Frost Bankers Inc. boosted its stake in shares of Okta by 88.3% during the 2nd quarter. Cullen Frost Bankers Inc. now owns 339 shares of the company’s stock worth $34,000 after acquiring an additional 159 shares in the last quarter. Westside Investment Management Inc. grew its holdings in shares of Okta by 86.9% in the 3rd quarter. Westside Investment Management Inc. now owns 415 shares of the company’s stock worth $38,000 after acquiring an additional 193 shares during the period. Finally, Financial Consulate Inc. acquired a new stake in shares of Okta in the 3rd quarter worth approximately $40,000. 86.64% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several brokerages recently issued reports on OKTA. Needham & Company LLC reaffirmed a “buy” rating and set a $110.00 price objective on shares of Okta in a report on Friday, December 12th. Jefferies Financial Group raised Okta from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and lifted their price target for the stock from $90.00 to $125.00 in a research note on Tuesday, December 16th. Truist Financial decreased their price objective on shares of Okta from $125.00 to $115.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Tuesday, February 17th. Sanford C. Bernstein restated an “outperform” rating on shares of Okta in a report on Monday, December 1st. Finally, Citigroup restated a “neutral” rating on shares of Okta in a research report on Monday, January 12th. Twenty-five research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, twelve have given a Hold rating and two have given a Sell rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, Okta currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $112.56.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, CFO Brett Tighe sold 10,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, January 13th. The stock was sold at an average price of $95.07, for a total value of $950,700.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer directly owned 134,385 shares in the company, valued at approximately $12,775,981.95. This represents a 6.93% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, insider Larissa Schwartz sold 1,836 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, February 6th. The stock was sold at an average price of $83.47, for a total value of $153,250.92. Following the completion of the sale, the insider directly owned 36,328 shares in the company, valued at approximately $3,032,298.16. The trade was a 4.81% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. Insiders sold 37,245 shares of company stock worth $3,385,624 in the last three months. Company insiders own 5.68% of the company’s stock.

Okta Trading Down 6.4%

NASDAQ:OKTA opened at $69.51 on Tuesday. The firm has a market cap of $12.32 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 63.77, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.98 and a beta of 0.77. Okta, Inc. has a 12-month low of $68.77 and a 12-month high of $127.57. The company’s 50-day moving average is $87.75 and its two-hundred day moving average is $88.34.

Okta (NASDAQ:OKTA) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, December 2nd. The company reported $0.82 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.76 by $0.06. Okta had a net margin of 6.87% and a return on equity of 3.77%. The business had revenue of $742.00 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $730.23 million. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm posted $0.67 earnings per share. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 11.6% compared to the same quarter last year. Okta has set its FY 2026 guidance at 3.430-3.440 EPS and its Q4 2026 guidance at 0.840-0.850 EPS. On average, equities research analysts forecast that Okta, Inc. will post 0.42 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Okta declared that its board has authorized a share buyback program on Monday, January 5th that authorizes the company to buyback $1.00 billion in outstanding shares. This buyback authorization authorizes the company to buy up to 6.8% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares buyback programs are typically an indication that the company’s leadership believes its stock is undervalued.

Okta Profile

Okta, Inc is a publicly traded provider of identity and access management solutions, headquartered in San Francisco, California. Founded in 2009 by Todd McKinnon and Frederic Kerrest, the company completed its initial public offering in April 2017. Under the leadership of McKinnon as chief executive officer and Kerrest as chief operating officer, Okta has grown into a leading vendor in the cybersecurity space, focusing on secure user authentication, single sign-on and lifecycle management for digital identities.

At the core of Okta’s offering is the Okta Identity Cloud, a suite of cloud-native services that enable organizations to manage user access across web and mobile applications, on-premises systems and APIs.