UBS Group Begins Coverage on Cogent Communications (NASDAQ:CCOI)

UBS Group initiated coverage on shares of Cogent Communications (NASDAQ:CCOI) in a research note published on Thursday morning, MarketBeat reports. The firm issued a buy rating and a $102.00 target price on the technology company’s stock.

Other research analysts also recently issued reports about the stock. KeyCorp boosted their price objective on shares of Cogent Communications from $80.00 to $90.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Tuesday, August 27th. The Goldman Sachs Group boosted their price target on shares of Cogent Communications from $62.00 to $71.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday, October 4th. Citigroup raised their price objective on shares of Cogent Communications from $70.00 to $82.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Monday, August 19th. Royal Bank of Canada reiterated an “outperform” rating and set a $74.00 target price on shares of Cogent Communications in a report on Tuesday, September 3rd. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted their price target on Cogent Communications from $70.00 to $76.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Monday, August 12th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, two have given a hold rating, four have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $80.25.

Cogent Communications Stock Up 2.0 %

NASDAQ CCOI opened at $79.40 on Thursday. Cogent Communications has a 1 year low of $50.80 and a 1 year high of $86.76. The stock has a market capitalization of $3.89 billion, a PE ratio of 101.79 and a beta of 0.40. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 5.87, a current ratio of 2.03 and a quick ratio of 2.03. The business’s 50-day moving average is $78.20 and its 200 day moving average is $68.17.

Cogent Communications (NASDAQ:CCOI) last released its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, November 7th. The technology company reported ($1.33) earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of ($1.34) by $0.01. Cogent Communications had a negative return on equity of 36.31% and a net margin of 3.73%. The business had revenue of $257.20 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $258.69 million. During the same quarter last year, the business posted ($1.13) EPS. The business’s revenue was down 6.6% on a year-over-year basis. Sell-side analysts forecast that Cogent Communications will post -4.54 earnings per share for the current year.

Cogent Communications Increases Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, December 6th. Stockholders of record on Friday, November 22nd will be issued a dividend of $0.995 per share. The ex-dividend date is Friday, November 22nd. This is an increase from Cogent Communications’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.99. This represents a $3.98 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 5.01%. Cogent Communications’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 505.13%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, VP John B. Chang sold 2,280 shares of the stock in a transaction on Tuesday, November 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $80.41, for a total transaction of $183,334.80. Following the sale, the vice president now directly owns 69,300 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $5,572,413. This trade represents a 3.19 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Also, Director Lewis H. Ferguson sold 1,550 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, August 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $72.62, for a total value of $112,561.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director now directly owns 17,748 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,288,859.76. This trade represents a 8.03 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 68,500 shares of company stock worth $5,008,175 in the last quarter. Corporate insiders own 11.40% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of Cogent Communications

A number of large investors have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. State Street Corp lifted its position in Cogent Communications by 1.3% during the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 1,750,810 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $132,921,000 after purchasing an additional 22,738 shares during the period. EdgePoint Investment Group Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Cogent Communications by 0.3% during the 3rd quarter. EdgePoint Investment Group Inc. now owns 1,542,503 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $117,107,000 after buying an additional 5,307 shares during the period. Harspring Capital Management LLC boosted its stake in shares of Cogent Communications by 6.0% in the 2nd quarter. Harspring Capital Management LLC now owns 1,176,500 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $66,402,000 after buying an additional 66,500 shares during the last quarter. Thrivent Financial for Lutherans grew its holdings in shares of Cogent Communications by 0.4% in the third quarter. Thrivent Financial for Lutherans now owns 1,039,458 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $78,916,000 after acquiring an additional 4,197 shares during the period. Finally, Geode Capital Management LLC increased its position in Cogent Communications by 0.3% during the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 1,014,322 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $77,021,000 after acquiring an additional 3,093 shares during the last quarter. 92.45% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Cogent Communications Company Profile

Cogent Communications Holdings, Inc, through its subsidiaries, provides high-speed Internet access, private network, and data center colocation space services in North America, Europe, Oceania, South America, and Africa. The company offers on-net Internet access and private network services to law firms, financial services firms, and advertising and marketing firms, as well as heath care providers, educational institutions and other professional services businesses, other Internet service providers, telephone companies, cable television companies, web hosting companies, media service providers, mobile phone operators, content delivery network companies, and commercial content and application service providers.