Ciena Co. (NYSE:CIEN) SVP Jason Phipps Sells 5,648 Shares

Ciena Co. (NYSE:CIEN) SVP Jason Phipps sold 5,648 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, January 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $84.64, for a total transaction of $478,046.72. Following the transaction, the senior vice president now directly owns 109,878 shares in the company, valued at $9,300,073.92. The trade was a 4.89 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this link.

Ciena Trading Up 0.9 %

NYSE CIEN opened at $84.40 on Tuesday. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $75.36 and its 200-day simple moving average is $62.32. The stock has a market cap of $11.99 billion, a P/E ratio of 89.79, a PEG ratio of 5.95 and a beta of 0.89. Ciena Co. has a 52 week low of $43.30 and a 52 week high of $91.82. The company has a current ratio of 4.06, a quick ratio of 2.99 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.53.

Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, December 12th. The communications equipment provider reported $0.54 EPS for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.66 by ($0.12). The firm had revenue of $1.12 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.10 billion. Ciena had a return on equity of 5.98% and a net margin of 3.44%. The business’s quarterly revenue was down .5% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm earned $0.56 EPS. Equities research analysts predict that Ciena Co. will post 1.13 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Ciena announced that its Board of Directors has authorized a share repurchase plan on Wednesday, October 2nd that allows the company to buyback $1.00 billion in shares. This buyback authorization allows the communications equipment provider to reacquire up to 10.5% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback plans are often an indication that the company’s leadership believes its shares are undervalued.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Ciena

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of the business. Everence Capital Management Inc. acquired a new stake in shares of Ciena during the fourth quarter worth approximately $235,000. GAMMA Investing LLC boosted its stake in Ciena by 27.7% during the 4th quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 2,109 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $179,000 after acquiring an additional 458 shares during the last quarter. Versant Capital Management Inc grew its holdings in Ciena by 925.0% during the 4th quarter. Versant Capital Management Inc now owns 328 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $28,000 after acquiring an additional 296 shares in the last quarter. Retirement Systems of Alabama increased its position in shares of Ciena by 4.8% in the 3rd quarter. Retirement Systems of Alabama now owns 403,490 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $24,851,000 after purchasing an additional 18,426 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Sanctuary Advisors LLC raised its stake in shares of Ciena by 75.8% in the 3rd quarter. Sanctuary Advisors LLC now owns 8,315 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $512,000 after purchasing an additional 3,584 shares in the last quarter. 91.99% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several research firms recently weighed in on CIEN. Morgan Stanley downgraded Ciena from an “overweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating and set a $63.00 target price on the stock. in a research report on Monday, October 28th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. downgraded shares of Ciena from an “overweight” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $65.00 price target on the stock. in a research note on Monday, October 7th. Barclays boosted their price objective on shares of Ciena from $67.00 to $97.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Friday, December 13th. Evercore ISI lowered Ciena from an “outperform” rating to an “in-line” rating and set a $65.00 target price on the stock. in a research report on Tuesday, October 15th. Finally, Needham & Company LLC upped their price target on Ciena from $80.00 to $95.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, December 13th. Seven analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and seven have issued a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $77.00.

Ciena Company Profile

Ciena Corporation provides hardware and software services for delivery of video, data, and voice traffic metro, aggregation, and access communications network worldwide. The company’s Networking Platforms segment offers convergence of coherent optical transport, open optical networking, optical transport network switching, IP routing, and switching services.