Ciena Co. (NYSE:CIEN) CEO Gary B. Smith Sells 4,166 Shares of Stock

Ciena Co. (NYSE:CIEN) CEO Gary B. Smith sold 4,166 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, April 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $44.80, for a total value of $186,636.80. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 385,109 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $17,252,883.20. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website.

Ciena Price Performance

Ciena stock opened at $44.78 on Thursday. Ciena Co. has a one year low of $39.94 and a one year high of $63.24. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.53, a quick ratio of 3.12 and a current ratio of 4.29. The business has a fifty day moving average of $52.30 and a two-hundred day moving average of $48.22. The company has a market cap of $6.48 billion, a P/E ratio of 29.08, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.03 and a beta of 0.99.

Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, March 7th. The communications equipment provider reported $0.66 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.48 by $0.18. Ciena had a return on equity of 9.92% and a net margin of 5.22%. The business had revenue of $1.04 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.02 billion. During the same quarter last year, the business posted $0.48 earnings per share. The business’s revenue for the quarter was down 1.8% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, analysts predict that Ciena Co. will post 1.46 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in CIEN. Raymond James Financial Services Advisors Inc. increased its position in shares of Ciena by 0.9% in the first quarter. Raymond James Financial Services Advisors Inc. now owns 28,651 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $1,737,000 after buying an additional 252 shares in the last quarter. American Century Companies Inc. increased its position in shares of Ciena by 11.0% in the first quarter. American Century Companies Inc. now owns 17,204 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $1,043,000 after buying an additional 1,708 shares in the last quarter. Bank of Montreal Can raised its stake in Ciena by 0.6% in the 1st quarter. Bank of Montreal Can now owns 36,296 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $2,227,000 after purchasing an additional 220 shares during the last quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP raised its stake in Ciena by 2.4% in the 1st quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 1,753,752 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $106,335,000 after purchasing an additional 41,815 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Vontobel Holding Ltd. raised its stake in Ciena by 40.6% in the 1st quarter. Vontobel Holding Ltd. now owns 19,106 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $1,172,000 after purchasing an additional 5,516 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 91.99% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

CIEN has been the subject of several research analyst reports. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased their price objective on Ciena from $56.00 to $67.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Tuesday, March 5th. Evercore ISI increased their price objective on Ciena from $57.00 to $63.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Friday, February 23rd. BNP Paribas assumed coverage on Ciena in a report on Thursday, April 11th. They issued an “outperform” rating and a $57.00 price objective for the company. StockNews.com raised Ciena from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Friday, March 8th. Finally, Citigroup assumed coverage on Ciena in a report on Friday, April 12th. They set a “sell” rating and a $44.00 price target for the company. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, two have given a hold rating, eight have assigned a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $58.79.

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.