Why Tenable Stock Is Soaring Today

What happened

The stock of Tenable (NASDAQ:TENB) was making big gains Wednesday following the release of the cybersecurity specialist's second-quarter report. The share price was up 8.2% as of 1:15 p.m. ET today.

Tenable published its results after the market closed yesterday, posting sales and earnings for the period that topped the market's expectations. The company recorded adjusted earnings per share (EPS) of $0.22 on revenue of $195 million. Prior to the release, the average analyst estimate had called for EPS of $0.12 on sales of $188.5 million.

So what

Revenue rose 18.7% year over year in the second quarter, and its adjusted earnings were up 340% year over year in the period. The company continued to see strong momentum for customer additions, bringing 379 new enterprise customers to its platform -- 24 of which had contract values worth $100,000 or more.

Following the release, Wedbush Securities analyst Dan Ives published new coverage on the stock, maintaining his outperform rating and raising his one-year price target from $45 per share to $55 thanks to strong execution and business momentum heading into the second half of the year.

Now what

In addition to better-than-anticipated second-quarter results, Tenable also issued guidance that beat the market's expectations and raised its full-year performance targets.

For the third quarter, Tenable is guiding for sales to come in between $197 million and $199 million, topping Wall Street's previous average target of $194.5 million. The company expects adjusted EPS between $0.18 and $0.19 for the period, also beating the earlier average analyst estimate's call for EPS of $0.16.

For the full year, management sees sales between $879 million and $887 million, beating the average analyst expectation for revenue of $781 million. Tenable also issued guidance for annual adjusted EPS between $0.65 and $0.69, which beat Wall Street's average target of $0.59. Meanwhile, Tenable's previous guidance had called for EPS between $0.57 and $0.61.

All in all, it was a strong beat-and-raise quarter for the cybersecurity company, and its stock could have room to run from here.

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Keith Noonan has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.