Qualys (NASDAQ:QLYS) CEO Sumedh Thakar Sells 10,000 Shares

Qualys, Inc. (NASDAQ:QLYS) CEO Sumedh Thakar sold 10,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, June 26th. The stock was sold at an average price of $120.48, for a total value of $1,204,800.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer owned 236,686 shares in the company, valued at $28,515,929.28. The trade was a 4.05% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan.

Qualys Stock Up 4.1%

Shares of Qualys stock traded up $5.05 during midday trading on Monday, hitting $128.32. The company had a trading volume of 781,121 shares, compared to its average volume of 753,255. The stock has a market cap of $4.52 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 23.04 and a beta of 0.65. The company has a fifty day simple moving average of $100.46 and a 200 day simple moving average of $109.24. Qualys, Inc. has a 12-month low of $74.51 and a 12-month high of $155.47.

Qualys (NASDAQ:QLYS) last released its earnings results on Tuesday, May 5th. The software maker reported $1.95 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.81 by $0.14. The company had revenue of $175.64 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $173.63 million. Qualys had a net margin of 29.41% and a return on equity of 37.15%. Qualys’s revenue was up 9.8% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $1.67 EPS. Qualys has set its FY 2026 guidance at 7.440-7.650 EPS and its Q2 2026 guidance at 1.730-1.800 EPS. As a group, analysts expect that Qualys, Inc. will post 5.47 EPS for the current year.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Qualys

Several hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in QLYS. Nordea Investment Management AB lifted its holdings in Qualys by 62.4% in the fourth quarter. Nordea Investment Management AB now owns 125,636 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $16,769,000 after acquiring an additional 48,267 shares during the period. Comerica Bank grew its stake in shares of Qualys by 100.6% during the 4th quarter. Comerica Bank now owns 22,710 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $3,018,000 after purchasing an additional 11,391 shares during the period. Fort Washington Investment Advisors Inc. OH increased its holdings in shares of Qualys by 9.8% during the 4th quarter. Fort Washington Investment Advisors Inc. OH now owns 208,832 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $27,754,000 after purchasing an additional 18,711 shares in the last quarter. GHP Investment Advisors Inc. increased its holdings in shares of Qualys by 6,727.1% during the 4th quarter. GHP Investment Advisors Inc. now owns 14,883 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $1,978,000 after purchasing an additional 14,665 shares in the last quarter. Finally, SG Americas Securities LLC lifted its stake in shares of Qualys by 147.0% in the 4th quarter. SG Americas Securities LLC now owns 33,416 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $4,441,000 after purchasing an additional 19,889 shares during the period. 99.31% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities analysts recently issued reports on QLYS shares. William Blair lowered Qualys from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating in a research note on Tuesday, April 28th. Piper Sandler cut their price objective on Qualys from $135.00 to $100.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Wednesday, May 6th. Royal Bank Of Canada raised their price objective on Qualys from $85.00 to $90.00 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, May 6th. Canaccord Genuity Group decreased their target price on Qualys from $150.00 to $125.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, May 6th. Finally, Truist Financial dropped their target price on Qualys from $120.00 to $85.00 and set a “hold” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, April 24th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, two have issued a Buy rating, eleven have issued a Hold rating and three have given a Sell rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Qualys presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $122.14.

About Qualys

Qualys, Inc (NASDAQ: QLYS) is a leading provider of cloud-based security and compliance solutions designed to help organizations streamline their IT security programs. Operating on a unified, modular platform, Qualys offers continuous visibility into global IT assets through a combination of lightweight cloud agents and on-premises scanner appliances. The platform supports an array of security and compliance use cases, enabling real-time detection of vulnerabilities, policy violations and misconfigurations across on-premises, cloud and hybrid environments.

The company’s flagship Qualys Cloud Platform delivers a suite of integrated applications, including vulnerability management, detection and response (VMDR), policy compliance, web application scanning, file integrity monitoring, asset inventory and container security.