The cybersecurity landscape is growing complicated with every passing day, as cybercriminals are using a variety of techniques, including credential theft and abuse, remote desktop protocol attacks and social engineering-based initial access by exploiting vulnerabilities ranging from unpatched software to compromised credentials.
The advent of artificial intelligence has further complicated the task for traditional cybersecurity products based on signature-based threat detection. The use of AI enables cybercriminals to execute better adaptive attacks with automation and self-evolving malware, breaching security measures based on previously traced malware signatures. AI-generated deepfake voices have also made phishing attacks more efficient and scalable.
As cyberspace is growing unsafe, so is the demand growing for better and updated cybersecurity products that could shield organizations, enterprises and individuals against them. The global cybersecurity industry is experiencing massive growth fueled by the rise of ransomware and phishing attacks, the growing trend of remote and hybrid work culture necessitating endpoint security management and booming cloud security demand.
The overall cybersecurity market is expected to continue to grow, as suggested by the MarketsandMarkets report, projecting a robust CAGR of 9.4% from 2023 to 2028. This makes it an ideal time for investors to capitalize on this opportunity and maximize their returns.
Here we focus on three stocks — Okta, Inc. OKTA, Fortinet Inc. FTNT and CrowdStrike Holdings, Inc. CRWD — that are anticipated to benefit from this elevated spending.
Okta is a leading provider of identity security for enterprises. Okta’s Workforce Identity Cloud combines access management, identity governance and privileged access to provide a gateway that enables its workforce-based customers to securely connect to Okta’s applications from multiple devices. Okta’s Customer Identity Cloud provides bot detection, fraud prevention and account takeover attack protection. Both platforms offer Adaptive Multi-Factor Authentication for secured connectivity.
Its Workforce Identity Cloud and Customer Identity Cloud solutions are experiencing increased traction as a growing number of organizations are adopting digital transformation and cloud migration strategies. The company was serving 19,650 customers at the end of the fourth quarter of fiscal 2025.
Okta anticipates its fiscal 2026 revenues to be in the range of $2.85-$2.86 billion. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for the same is pegged at $2.79 billion, indicating year-over-year growth of 6.5%. The company expects its fiscal 2026 earnings to be in the range of $3.15-$3.20 per share. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for the same is pegged at $2.91, indicating year-over-year growth of 3.6%. Okta has rallied 49.5% in the past six months compared with First Trust NASDAQ Cybersecurity ETF’s CIBR return of 11.1%.
The company’s earnings surpassed Zacks Consensus Estimate in each of the trailing four quarters, the average surprise being 15.7%. OKTA carries a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy) at present. You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.
Okta, Inc. price-consensus-chart | Okta, Inc. Quote
Fortinet provides firewall, virtual private networking, antivirus, intrusion prevention (IP), web filtering, anti-spam and wide area network (WAN) acceleration. The company offers Identity and Access Management through FortiToken and FortiAuthenticator. The company provides advanced threat protection through FortiGate Next-Generation Firewalls, FortiGate Secure SD-WAN, FortiSandbox and FortiDeceptor. Its endpoint security solutions, including FortiCASB, FortiEDR and FortiClient, are also popular among organizations.
This comprehensive portfolio of security offerings enables the company to provide integrated protection against dynamic security threats while reducing security complexities and lowering the total cost of ownership. The company caters to more than 450,000 customers worldwide, which include most of the Fortune 100 companies.
Fortinet anticipates its fiscal 2025 revenues to be in the range of $6.65-$6.85 billion. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for the same is pegged at $6.76 billion, indicating year-over-year growth of 13.5%. The company expects its fiscal 2025 earnings to be in the range of $2.41-$2.47. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for the same is pegged at $2.43, indicating year-over-year growth of 2.5%.
FTNT carries a Zacks Rank #2 at present. Fortinet has risen 42.1% in the past six months compared with First Trust NASDAQ Cybersecurity ETF’s return of 11.1%. The company’s earnings surpassed Zacks Consensus Estimate in each of the trailing four quarters, the average surprise being 24.8%.
Fortinet, Inc. price-consensus-chart | Fortinet, Inc. Quote
Find the latest EPS estimates and surprises on Zacks Earnings Calendar.
CrowdStrike offers its cybersecurity services primarily through its Falcon platform that is acclaimed to be the industry’s first multi-tenant, cloud native, intelligent security solution that protects workloads across on-premise, cloud-based, and virtualized environments running on a variety of endpoints, such as desktops, laptops, servers, virtual machines, and IoT devices.
CrowdStrike’s cloud-based Falcon platform currently provides 22 cloud modules via a SaaS subscription model that is categorised under three categories — Endpoint Security, Security & IT Operations and Threat Intelligence. The contribution of subscription-based sales to the company’s total revenues increased from 72% in fiscal 2017 to 94% in fiscal 2024.
CrowdStrike anticipates its fiscal 2025 revenues to be between $3.9238 billion and $3.9305 billion. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for the same is pegged at $3.93 billion, indicating year-over-year growth of 28.6%. The company expects its fiscal 2025 earnings to be in the range of $3.74-$3.76. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for the same is pegged at $3.74, indicating year-over-year growth of 21%.
The company’s earnings surpassed Zacks Consensus Estimate in each of the trailing four quarters, the average surprise being 10.3%. CRWD carries a Zacks Rank #2 at present. CRWD has rallied 47.8% in the past six months compared with First Trust NASDAQ Cybersecurity ETF’s return of 11.1%.
CrowdStrike price-consensus-chart | CrowdStrike Quote
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Fortinet, Inc. (FTNT) : Free Stock Analysis Report
First Trust NASDAQ Cybersecurity ETF (CIBR): ETF Research Reports
Okta, Inc. (OKTA) : Free Stock Analysis Report
CrowdStrike (CRWD) : Free Stock Analysis Report
This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).
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