Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) Hits New 1-Year High – Here’s Why

Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO)’s share price hit a new 52-week high during trading on Wednesday . The stock traded as high as $60.32 and last traded at $60.28, with a volume of 2929187 shares trading hands. The stock had previously closed at $59.33.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several brokerages have recently commented on CSCO. Morgan Stanley upped their price target on Cisco Systems from $62.00 to $68.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Tuesday, December 17th. Wells Fargo & Company upped their price target on Cisco Systems from $57.00 to $60.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Thursday, November 14th. Tigress Financial upped their price target on Cisco Systems from $76.00 to $78.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Monday, October 14th. Evercore ISI upped their price target on Cisco Systems from $55.00 to $60.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Friday, September 20th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. upgraded Cisco Systems from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and boosted their price objective for the company from $55.00 to $66.00 in a report on Monday, November 11th. Eight research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twelve have assigned a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, Cisco Systems has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $61.28.

Cisco Systems Stock Down 0.3 %

The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.43, a quick ratio of 0.80 and a current ratio of 0.88. The company has a market cap of $238.24 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 25.67, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 4.37 and a beta of 0.84. The business has a 50-day simple moving average of $58.83 and a 200-day simple moving average of $53.39.

Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) last issued its earnings results on Wednesday, November 13th. The network equipment provider reported $0.91 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.87 by $0.04. Cisco Systems had a return on equity of 25.70% and a net margin of 17.73%. The business had revenue of $13.84 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $13.78 billion. During the same quarter last year, the company earned $0.98 EPS. The business’s quarterly revenue was down 5.6% on a year-over-year basis. On average, equities analysts anticipate that Cisco Systems, Inc. will post 2.97 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Cisco Systems Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, January 22nd. Stockholders of record on Friday, January 3rd will be given a dividend of $0.40 per share. This represents a $1.60 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.67%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, January 3rd. Cisco Systems’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 68.67%.

Insider Transactions at Cisco Systems

In related news, SVP Maria Victoria Wong sold 586 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, December 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $58.69, for a total transaction of $34,392.34. Following the transaction, the senior vice president now owns 50,767 shares in the company, valued at $2,979,515.23. This trade represents a 1.14 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. Also, CEO Charles Robbins sold 171,744 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, November 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $57.49, for a total value of $9,873,562.56. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 783,786 shares in the company, valued at $45,059,857.14. This represents a 17.97 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last 90 days, insiders have sold 353,522 shares of company stock valued at $20,349,721. Corporate insiders own 0.01% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. State Street Corp grew its stake in Cisco Systems by 1.7% during the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 193,489,477 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock worth $10,297,506,000 after buying an additional 3,241,682 shares during the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC grew its stake in shares of Cisco Systems by 1.3% in the 3rd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 95,630,469 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $5,075,320,000 after purchasing an additional 1,262,017 shares during the last quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. grew its stake in shares of Cisco Systems by 2.1% in the 3rd quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 82,720,255 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $4,402,239,000 after purchasing an additional 1,677,383 shares during the last quarter. FMR LLC grew its stake in shares of Cisco Systems by 10.1% in the 3rd quarter. FMR LLC now owns 63,931,461 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $3,402,432,000 after purchasing an additional 5,885,879 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Legal & General Group Plc grew its stake in shares of Cisco Systems by 3.3% in the 2nd quarter. Legal & General Group Plc now owns 47,593,944 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $2,261,185,000 after purchasing an additional 1,530,468 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 73.33% of the company’s stock.

About Cisco Systems

Cisco Systems, Inc designs, manufactures, and sells Internet Protocol based networking and other products related to the communications and information technology industry in the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, the Asia Pacific, Japan, and China. The company also offers switching portfolio encompasses campus switching as well as data center switching; enterprise routing portfolio interconnects public and private wireline and mobile networks, delivering highly secure, and reliable connectivity to campus, data center and branch networks; wireless products include wireless access points and controllers; and compute portfolio including the cisco unified computing system, hyperflex, and software management capabilities, which combine computing, networking, and storage infrastructure management and virtualization.