As the Q4 earnings season comes to a close, it’s time to take stock of this quarter’s best and worst performers in the cybersecurity industry, including CrowdStrike (NASDAQ:CRWD) and its peers.
Cybersecurity continues to be one of the fastest-growing segments within software for good reason. Almost every company is slowly finding itself becoming a technology company and facing rising cybersecurity risks. Businesses are accelerating adoption of cloud-based software, moving data and applications into the cloud to save costs while improving performance. This migration has opened them to a multitude of new threats, like employees accessing data via their smartphone while on an open network, or logging into a web-based interface from a laptop in a new location.
The 9 cybersecurity stocks we track reported a mixed Q4. As a group, revenues beat analysts’ consensus estimates by 1.5% while next quarter’s revenue guidance was in line.
Amidst this news, share prices of the companies have had a rough stretch. On average, they are down 13.6% since the latest earnings results.
Known for detecting the massive SolarWinds hack in 2020 that compromised numerous government agencies, CrowdStrike (NASDAQ:CRWD) provides cloud-based cybersecurity solutions that protect endpoints, cloud workloads, identity, and data through its Falcon platform.
CrowdStrike reported revenues of $1.31 billion, up 23.3% year on year. This print exceeded analysts’ expectations by 0.6%. Overall, it was a strong quarter for the company with an impressive beat of analysts’ billings estimates and a solid beat of analysts’ EBITDA estimates.
The market was likely pricing in the results, and the stock is flat since reporting. It currently trades at $394.82.
Read why we think that CrowdStrike is one of the best cybersecurity stocks, our full report is free.
Pioneering the “zero trust” approach that has fundamentally changed enterprise network security, Zscaler (NASDAQ:ZS) provides a cloud-based security platform that connects users, devices, and applications securely without traditional network-based security hardware.
Zscaler reported revenues of $815.8 million, up 25.9% year on year, outperforming analysts’ expectations by 2.1%. The business had a strong quarter with EPS guidance for next quarter exceeding analysts’ expectations and full-year EPS guidance exceeding analysts’ expectations.
Zscaler pulled off the fastest revenue growth among its peers. Although it had a fine quarter compared its peers, the market seems unhappy with the results as the stock is down 15.3% since reporting. It currently trades at $141.72.
