Schulz Duggan
AI Supply-Chain Research, Optics/Memory/Macro, Original Asian/US Filings & Pricing
Zscaler's after-hours rally is paying for profit, not growth, and the growth outlook remains weak. It beat every line, but reaffirmed fiscal 2027 ARR growth of 16.6% to 17.4%, the framework that sank the stock 31% in May, implying net new ARR down 13% to 17%; excluding Red Canary, organic net new ARR is roughly flat. Q4 free cash flow margin fell to 7% from 24% as capex nearly tripled, and the flat 23.0-23.5% FY27 margin guide rests on a memory-price assumption. x.comÂ
Zscaler's 16-17% fiscal 2027 growth framework is roughly what the business already does organically, so the slowdown looks real. Excluding the $137 million Red Canary deal, fiscal 2026 net new ARR is $593 million, versus $599-637 million implied for 2027. Higher memory and processor costs cut its free cash flow margin guide to 22.8-23.3% from 26.5-27%, while CrowdStrike's net new ARR rose 51%. Q4 organic net new ARR well above $205-214 million, with new-logo counts, would change the view. x.comÂ
Zscaler's management is undermining trust in the stock even after a quarter that beat on revenue, EPS, billings and guidance. On the call the CFO offered a 16-17% FY27 guide before FY26 ended and contradicted himself, leaving investors scared. FCF margin guidance fell on higher data center capex, with 2027 capex guided another 200bp of revenue higher. Mythos looks like the real value-add, making cybersecurity names look like resale wrappers around AI LLMs. Very tough for long-term holders. x.com … Show more
Zscaler should sell off on its guide for 9.5% organic ARR growth in fiscal 2027. That makes it a slow-moving software company with excellent dollar-based net retention but a withering growth engine, not an AI winner. x.comÂ
Zscaler is a no-brainer at this price, and selling it on a small Q4 revenue guidance miss makes no sense. Q3 beat on revenue ($850M vs $836M), EPS, operating income and ARR ($3.53B), and Q4 EPS guidance of $1.09 topped the $1.04 estimate, while revenue guidance was $877M versus $879M, per @StockSavvyShay. x.com x.comÂ
Zscaler's forward guide was gross and undercuts management's credibility. CEO Jay Chaudhry claimed that once growth fell below 30%, the company would see operating leverage every year; that promise now looks false. x.comÂ
Zscaler is not cheap at 40x earnings, about double an initial guess of 20x. @StockSavvyShay pulled up the real figure live on air ahead of Zscaler's Thursday report. x.comÂ
Zscaler's AI-era cybersecurity thesis is now showing up in bookings. Q3 beat across every line: ARR crossed $3.5B, up 25% or 21% excluding Red Canary, and non-GAAP operating margin hit a record 23%. AI Protect bookings topped $100M, Data Security ARR passed $500M, and Zero Trust Everywhere customers rose from 550+ to 700+. Partnerships with Anthropic and OpenAI and the planned Symmetry Systems deal for AI agent identity add catalysts; a preliminary 16-17% FY27 outlook sets a credible bar. x.comÂ
Fortinet's recurring service growth is slowing while its firewall product refresh does the heavy lifting. Service revenue grew 13% versus 37% for products, and the full-year service guide was cut to $5.15-$5.17 billion. A cut to the recurring guide rarely gets bought back in a week; this looks like the start of a rerating lower. x.comÂ
Rubrik's high switching costs and emerging AI-security demand underpin growth that looks attractively valued. At 12.9x forward EV/sales, it trades below the cybersecurity peer median relative to expected revenue growth. Subscription ARR grew 32.6% YoY and net dollar retention reached 119%. Agentic AI security adoption remains early; non-GAAP operating margin hit 7.8%, though GAAP net income remains negative partly due to stock-based compensation. x.comÂ
Zscaler's enforcement layer looks undervalued, since AI commoditizes tools that produce answers but strengthens tools that enforce decisions. As a cloud proxy every user session must pass through, replacing it means re-architecting traffic, not swapping vendors. It trades at 8.6 times EV/sales on 25% growth, 47% below its 52-week high, with $1.11B of free cash flow and net cash. The case fails if Palo Alto, Netskope or Cisco make enforcement a checkbox in a platform bundle. x.comÂ
Cloudflare's valuation, about 28.5x EV/ARR and 453x run-rate GAAP EBIT, leaves little room for its competitive risks. Its SASE and developer-platform businesses face Zscaler, Palo Alto and hyperscalers with far bigger budgets, and OpenAI and Anthropic may keep inference on their own backends. The bull case is crisp and arguably priced in: bot security and edge workloads matter more as agents spread, growth sped up from 27% to 34%, and weekly agent requests doubled in January. x.comÂ
