Ciena Co. (NYSE:CIEN) CEO Sells $577,048.00 in Stock

Ciena Co. (NYSE:CIEN) CEO Gary B. Smith sold 6,800 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Monday, February 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $84.86, for a total value of $577,048.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 412,149 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $34,974,964.14. The trade was a 1.62 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website.

Ciena Stock Performance

Shares of CIEN stock traded up $2.73 during trading hours on Tuesday, reaching $87.85. The stock had a trading volume of 2,297,691 shares, compared to its average volume of 2,692,704. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.54, a current ratio of 3.55 and a quick ratio of 2.72. The firm has a 50-day simple moving average of $82.36 and a 200-day simple moving average of $67.57. The firm has a market capitalization of $12.49 billion, a PE ratio of 154.12, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.55 and a beta of 0.88. Ciena Co. has a twelve month low of $43.30 and a twelve month high of $101.44.

Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) last posted 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 the consensus estimate of $1.10 billion. Ciena had a return on equity of 4.72% and a net margin of 2.09%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was down .5% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted $0.56 EPS. As a group, equities analysts forecast that Ciena Co. will post 1.6 earnings per share for the current year.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of brokerages have recently issued reports on CIEN. Northland Securities boosted their target price on Ciena from $46.00 to $60.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a report on Friday, December 13th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upgraded shares of Ciena from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and boosted their price objective for the stock from $84.00 to $88.00 in a research note on Tuesday, January 28th. Rosenblatt Securities raised their target price on shares of Ciena from $75.00 to $94.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Friday, December 13th. Evercore ISI cut shares of Ciena from an “outperform” rating to an “in-line” rating and set a $65.00 price target for the company. in a research report on Tuesday, October 15th. Finally, BNP Paribas downgraded Ciena from an “outperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and increased their price target for the company from $59.00 to $67.00 in a report on Wednesday, October 9th. Six analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and eight have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $78.77.

Institutional Trading of Ciena

Several institutional investors and hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in CIEN. Hoese & Co LLP acquired a new stake in shares of Ciena during the third quarter valued at approximately $25,000. UMB Bank n.a. increased its holdings 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 valued at $28,000 after purchasing an additional 365 shares during the period. Versant Capital Management Inc lifted its position in shares of Ciena by 925.0% in the fourth quarter. Versant Capital Management Inc now owns 328 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $28,000 after purchasing an additional 296 shares in the last quarter. First Horizon Advisors Inc. boosted its holdings in shares of Ciena by 152.8% during the third 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 period. Finally, Kieckhefer Group LLC purchased a new position in Ciena during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $59,000. 91.99% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

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.