CrowdStrike
CrowdStrike CEO George Kurtz.
- Several Wall Street firms initiated coverage of cybersecurity provider CrowdStrike on Monday.
- CrowdStrike raised $612 million in its IPO, and the stock popped more than 70% on its first day of trading.
- Here's what Wall Street analysts had to say about the newly-public company.
- Watch CrowdStrike trade live.
Wall Street is ready to talk about CrowdStrike.
The cloud-based cybersecurity provider went public in early June, raising $612 million at an initial market capitalization of $6.7 billion. Shares exploded by more than 70% in their first day of trading.
CrowdStrike offers a cloud-based platform for endpoint security, threat intelligence, and cyberattack- response services.
Here's what Wall Street analysts had to say about CrowdStrike as they initiated coverage of the stock:
Oppenheimer: Outperform, $90 price target
Shaul Eyal, a senior analyst at Oppenheimer, cited CrowdStrike's superior technology and ability to leverage artificial intelligence and machine learnings as major drivers for his outperform rating and $90 price target.
"We believe CrowdStrike's innovative technology which layers on AI/ML to crowdsourced threat intelligence to stay ahead of the adversaries is superior to its competitors." Eyal said. "Our belief is CrowdStrike to displace and replace competitors' solutions, and to take market shares from legacy and next-gen antivirus vendors."
Needham & Company: Buy, $80 price target
A team of analysts at Needham & Company led by Alex Henderson believe CrowdStrike can continue to grow revenue by 50% to 100% per year over the next three to five years. CrowdStrike has yet to turn a profit and lost $140 million last year.
"CrowdStrike is spending to drive growth. It's the right thing to do," Henderson said in a research note on Monday.
Bank of America Merrill Lynch: Buy, $75 price target
Tal Liani and a group of other analysts at Bank of America Merrill Lynch said CrowdStrike is in a unique position to disrupt the$7 billion endpoint security market, which is just one part of its cloud offering.
"Focusing on the core endpoint market, the industry is in the midst of a major transition from legacy antivirus to more robust behavioral-based, next-gen platforms, where CrowdStrike shines with its superior machine learning, threat intelligence, lightweight agent, and a 100% cloud-based architecture." the team said in its report.
RBC Capital Markets: Sector Perform, $70 price target
A team of analysts at RBC Capital Markets led by Matthew Hedberg predict that CrowdStrike's total-addressable market could grow to $29.3 billion by 2021, and is currently valued at $24.6 billion. Hedberg and his team also said CrowdStrike has the potential to disrupt the security cloud in the same way Salesforce disrupted Customer Relationship Management software.
"While the TAM is substantial, we think it can expand as the company introduces new modules allowing it to grow more quickly than its markets by consolidating spending," Hedberg said in a note to clients on Monday.
SunTrust Robinson Humphrey: Hold, $69 price target
CrowdStrike's triple-digit revenue growth and momentum is already priced into the stock, according to Terry Tillman, an analyst at SunTrust Robinson Humphrey.
"The company is winning significant share by delivering unmatched protection against cyber attacks and stopping breaches," Tillman said in a research note on Monday.
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