Wedbush boosts Palo Alto Networks price target on “beatable” earnings and increased momentum in the field

Wedbush tech analyst Dan Ives is bumping up his price target on Palo Alto Networks ahead of the release of the cybersecurity company’s quarterly report later this week.

He now sees the stock running to $225 (prior: $200), believing the company “is seeing increased momentum in the field around its cyber security platformization strategy.”

Palo Alto Networks is scheduled to release its quarterly results on Thursday after the close, with analysts anticipating adjusted earnings of $0.82 per share on sales of about $2.24 billion.

“While not expecting major fireworks with [the upcoming] FY2Q25 earnings, the seeds of growth are now in place for a very important 2H25 with the cyber threat landscape seeing elevated activity and sophistication,” he wrote, adding that the company’s guidance as well as consensus estimates “remain beatable.”

Ives’ optimistic stance on the company is shared by most of his peers. A few weeks ago, Morgan Stanley boosted its price target for the stock as well. 70% of analysts surveyed by Bloomberg (including Ives!) have a buy rating on the company, with an average price target of $207.25. The stock closed at $196.40 on Monday.

“We believe cyber security is a 3rd derivative of the AI Revolution and PANW is well positioned to see incremental deal flow as more strategic enterprise AI projects take hold over the coming year,” the analyst wrote.

Palo Alto was among the group of stocks that got a bump even amid the DeepSeek-induced sell-off on January 27 after the Chinese AI developer claimed it was besieged by cyberattacks.