Ciena Co. (NYSE:CIEN) Receives Average Rating of “Hold” from Brokerages

Ciena Co. (NYSE:CIEN) has received a consensus rating of “Hold” from the thirteen analysts that are currently covering the stock, MarketBeat Ratings reports. Seven analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and six have assigned a buy rating to the company. The average 1-year price objective among analysts that have issued a report on the stock in the last year is $63.08.

Several equities analysts recently weighed in on the company. BNP Paribas downgraded Ciena from an “outperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and increased their target price for the stock from $59.00 to $67.00 in a research report on Wednesday, October 9th. Citigroup upgraded Ciena from a “sell” rating to a “buy” rating and raised their price objective for the stock from $44.00 to $68.00 in a report on Monday, September 23rd. Northland Securities restated a “market perform” rating and issued a $46.00 price objective on shares of Ciena in a report on Tuesday, September 3rd. Barclays raised their price objective on Ciena from $55.00 to $67.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Thursday, September 5th. Finally, Needham & Company LLC restated a “buy” rating and issued a $65.00 price objective on shares of Ciena in a report on Thursday, September 5th.

Ciena Stock Down 3.6 %

CIEN opened at $67.23 on Friday. The business’s fifty day simple moving average is $63.80 and its 200 day simple moving average is $54.57. Ciena has a 52 week low of $42.20 and a 52 week high of $73.47. The firm has a market cap of $9.71 billion, a P/E ratio of 71.52, a PEG ratio of 5.80 and a beta of 0.94. The company has a quick ratio of 2.99, a current ratio of 4.06 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.53.

Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, September 4th. The communications equipment provider reported $0.35 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.26 by $0.09. Ciena had a return on equity of 5.98% and a net margin of 3.44%. The firm had revenue of $942.30 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $928.31 million. During the same period in the prior year, the business posted $0.36 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was down 11.8% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities research analysts anticipate that Ciena 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.

Insider Buying and Selling at Ciena

In other Ciena news, SVP Jason Phipps sold 2,200 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, October 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $61.49, for a total transaction of $135,278.00. Following the completion of the sale, the senior vice president now owns 91,149 shares in the company, valued at $5,604,752.01. This trade represents a 2.36 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, SVP David M. Rothenstein sold 3,500 shares of Ciena stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, October 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $67.43, for a total value of $236,005.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the senior vice president now owns 199,997 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $13,485,797.71. The trade was a 1.72 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 9,200 shares of company stock worth $568,123 in the last 90 days. 0.83% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the company. Hoese & Co LLP acquired a new position in shares of Ciena in the 3rd quarter worth approximately $25,000. UMB Bank n.a. grew its position in shares of Ciena by 424.4% in the 3rd quarter. UMB Bank n.a. now owns 451 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $28,000 after acquiring an additional 365 shares in the last quarter. Headlands Technologies LLC bought a new stake in shares of Ciena in the 1st quarter worth approximately $40,000. Canton Hathaway LLC bought a new stake in shares of Ciena in the 2nd quarter worth approximately $40,000. Finally, First Horizon Advisors Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Ciena by 152.8% in the 3rd quarter. First Horizon Advisors Inc. now owns 847 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $52,000 after purchasing an additional 512 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 91.99% of the company’s stock.

About Ciena

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.