Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) Lowered to In-Line at Evercore ISI

Evercore ISI lowered shares of Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) from an outperform rating to an in-line rating in a report published on Tuesday, MarketBeat Ratings reports. Evercore ISI currently has $65.00 price target on the communications equipment provider’s stock.

A number of other equities analysts also recently commented on CIEN. Northland Securities reissued a “market perform” rating and issued a $46.00 target price on shares of Ciena in a research note on Tuesday, September 3rd. Needham & Company LLC reaffirmed a “buy” rating and set a $65.00 price target on shares of Ciena in a research note on Thursday, September 5th. Barclays lifted their price target on shares of Ciena from $55.00 to $67.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, September 5th. Bank of America reaffirmed a “neutral” rating and set a $59.00 price target on shares of Ciena in a research note on Thursday, September 5th. Finally, Morgan Stanley lifted their price target on shares of Ciena from $60.00 to $63.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 9th. Seven equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and seven have given a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $63.08.

Ciena Stock Performance

Shares of CIEN stock opened at $66.51 on Tuesday. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $58.38 and its 200-day simple moving average is $51.54. Ciena has a 52 week low of $39.94 and a 52 week high of $69.91. The company has a current ratio of 4.06, a quick ratio of 2.99 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.53. The company has a market cap of $9.56 billion, a PE ratio of 63.95, a P/E/G ratio of 8.83 and a beta of 0.94.

Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) last issued its earnings results on Wednesday, September 4th. The communications equipment provider reported $0.35 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.26 by $0.09. Ciena had a net margin of 3.44% and a return on equity of 5.98%. The business had revenue of $942.30 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $928.31 million. During the same quarter last year, the firm posted $0.36 EPS. The business’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 year.

Ciena declared that its board has approved a stock buyback plan on Wednesday, October 2nd that allows the company to repurchase $1.00 billion in shares. This repurchase authorization allows the communications equipment provider to repurchase up to 10.5% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase plans are generally a sign that the company’s board believes its stock is undervalued.

Insider Activity

In other news, SVP David M. Rothenstein sold 3,500 shares of Ciena stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, October 15th. The shares were 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 directly owns 199,997 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $13,485,797.71. The trade was a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. In other Ciena news, SVP David M. Rothenstein sold 3,500 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, October 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $67.43, for a total transaction of $236,005.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the senior vice president now directly owns 199,997 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $13,485,797.71. The trade was a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, SVP Jason Phipps sold 2,200 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, October 1st. The shares were sold at an average price of $61.49, for a total transaction of $135,278.00. Following the transaction, the senior vice president now directly owns 91,149 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $5,604,752.01. The trade was a 0.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last three months, insiders sold 9,200 shares of company stock valued at $568,123. Company insiders own 0.83% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of CIEN. Hoese & Co LLP acquired a new position in Ciena during the 3rd quarter valued at about $25,000. UMB Bank n.a. raised its position in shares of Ciena by 424.4% during the 3rd quarter. UMB Bank n.a. now owns 451 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $28,000 after buying an additional 365 shares in the last quarter. Kapitalo Investimentos Ltda bought a new stake in shares of Ciena during the 4th quarter worth about $30,000. Register Financial Advisors LLC bought a new stake in shares of Ciena during the 1st quarter worth about $33,000. Finally, Headlands Technologies LLC bought a new stake in shares of Ciena during the 1st quarter worth about $40,000. 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.