Berenberg raises target price on Darktrace

Berenberg, which stuck to its 'buy' rating on the stock, said Darktrace had provided "a very strong" update and was upgrading its full-year guidance on both growth and margins.

While Berenberg stated this alone would be positive, the analysts noted that the nuances of the update gave it "even more encouragement".

The German bank said key KPIs such as churn, upsell and net retention rate had all improved and added that Darktrace's new sales structure trials had "clearly worked", with the company opting to roll changes out more extensively from the second quarter onwards.

"This, coupled with detail that Darktrace will be launching a new product category at the end of this calendar year, suggests that customer acquisition and upsell could well surpass the already upgraded guidance. We increase our revenue forecasts by 4-6% over coming years," said Berenberg.