Juniper Networks, Inc. (NYSE:JNPR) Receives Consensus Recommendation of “Hold” from Brokerages

Shares of Juniper Networks, Inc. (NYSE:JNPR) have been assigned an average rating of “Hold” from the nine brokerages that are presently covering the firm, MarketBeat.com reports. Eight research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and one has issued a buy rating on the company. The average 1 year price objective among brokerages that have issued ratings on the stock in the last year is $37.63.

JNPR has been the topic of a number of research reports. Barclays dropped their price objective on shares of Juniper Networks from $41.00 to $40.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a report on Friday, July 26th. Citigroup reissued a “neutral” rating and issued a $40.00 price objective on shares of Juniper Networks in a report on Monday, September 23rd. StockNews.com initiated coverage on shares of Juniper Networks in a report on Monday, September 16th. They issued a “hold” rating on the stock. Finally, Needham & Company LLC reissued a “hold” rating on shares of Juniper Networks in a report on Friday, July 26th.

Juniper Networks Stock Performance

Shares of JNPR stock opened at $39.17 on Friday. The company has a 50 day moving average price of $38.84 and a 200-day moving average price of $37.07. Juniper Networks has a 52 week low of $24.87 and a 52 week high of $39.79. The firm has a market capitalization of $12.73 billion, a PE ratio of 56.77, a P/E/G ratio of 11.26 and a beta of 0.93. The company has a quick ratio of 1.23, a current ratio of 1.69 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.36.

Juniper Networks (NYSE:JNPR) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, July 25th. The network equipment provider reported $0.31 EPS for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.44 by ($0.13). Juniper Networks had a return on equity of 8.02% and a net margin of 4.58%. The company had revenue of $1.19 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.25 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm earned $0.42 earnings per share. The business’s revenue was down 16.8% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities research analysts expect that Juniper Networks will post 0.97 earnings per share for the current year.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of JNPR. Pacer Advisors Inc. boosted its stake in shares of Juniper Networks by 14,314.7% during the second quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. now owns 4,832,105 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $176,179,000 after purchasing an additional 4,798,583 shares during the period. Magnetar Financial LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Juniper Networks during the first quarter valued at $86,494,000. Canada Pension Plan Investment Board boosted its stake in shares of Juniper Networks by 859.1% during the first quarter. Canada Pension Plan Investment Board now owns 836,900 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $31,016,000 after purchasing an additional 749,641 shares during the period. Gabelli Funds LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Juniper Networks during the first quarter valued at $23,379,000. Finally, Natixis boosted its stake in shares of Juniper Networks by 1,524.4% during the first quarter. Natixis now owns 470,137 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $17,423,000 after purchasing an additional 441,194 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 91.95% of the company’s stock.

About Juniper Networks

Juniper Networks, Inc designs, develops, and sells network products and services worldwide. The company offers routing products, such as ACX series universal access routers to deploy high-bandwidth services; MX series Ethernet routers that function as a universal edge platform; PTX series packet transport routers; wide-area network SDN controllers; and session smart routers.