Unified Investment Management Buys New Shares in Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO)

Unified Investment Management purchased a new stake in shares of Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO) in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor purchased 13,694 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock, valued at approximately $811,000.

Other institutional investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Swedbank AB lifted its position in shares of Cisco Systems by 0.6% in the 3rd quarter. Swedbank AB now owns 9,029,594 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock worth $480,555,000 after purchasing an additional 52,711 shares during the period. Principal Securities Inc. increased its stake in Cisco Systems by 3.9% during the 3rd quarter. Principal Securities Inc. now owns 51,032 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $2,716,000 after purchasing an additional 1,907 shares in the last quarter. Farther Finance Advisors LLC grew its stake in shares of Cisco Systems by 8.7% in the third quarter. Farther Finance Advisors LLC now owns 69,954 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock worth $3,723,000 after acquiring an additional 5,600 shares during the period. Chicago Partners Investment Group LLC grew its stake in shares of Cisco Systems by 7.4% in the third quarter. Chicago Partners Investment Group LLC now owns 26,128 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock worth $1,471,000 after acquiring an additional 1,803 shares during the period. Finally, F M Investments LLC boosted its holdings in shares of Cisco Systems by 0.4% in the third quarter. F M Investments LLC now owns 138,011 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock worth $7,332,000 after buying an additional 535 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 73.33% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

CSCO has been the topic of several research analyst reports. BNP Paribas raised shares of Cisco Systems from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $72.00 target price on the stock in a report on Tuesday, January 28th. Melius upgraded shares of Cisco Systems from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and upped their price target for the stock from $66.00 to $73.00 in a report on Monday, January 6th. Morgan Stanley upped their price objective on shares of Cisco Systems from $62.00 to $68.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Tuesday, December 17th. Rosenblatt Securities raised shares of Cisco Systems from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and increased their price target for the company from $66.00 to $80.00 in a research report on Thursday, February 13th. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group increased their price target on shares of Cisco Systems from $56.00 to $63.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday, February 13th. Seven research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fifteen have issued a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $66.63.

Cisco Systems Stock Up 0.5 %

Cisco Systems stock opened at $64.14 on Monday. The firm has a market capitalization of $255.15 billion, a P/E ratio of 28.01, a P/E/G ratio of 4.16 and a beta of 0.84. The company has a 50-day simple moving average of $61.23 and a 200-day simple moving average of $56.95. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.43, a quick ratio of 0.79 and a current ratio of 0.87. Cisco Systems, Inc. has a one year low of $44.50 and a one year high of $66.50.

Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, February 12th. The network equipment provider reported $0.77 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.91 by ($0.14). Cisco Systems had a return on equity of 26.08% and a net margin of 16.96%. As a group, equities analysts expect that Cisco Systems, Inc. will post 3.04 earnings per share for the current year.

Cisco Systems Increases Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, April 23rd. Stockholders of record on Thursday, April 3rd will be issued a dividend of $0.41 per share. This represents a $1.64 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.56%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, April 3rd. This is a boost from Cisco Systems’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.40. Cisco Systems’s payout ratio is 71.62%.

Cisco Systems declared that its Board of Directors has initiated a stock buyback plan on Wednesday, February 12th that authorizes the company to buyback $15.00 billion in outstanding shares. This buyback authorization authorizes the network equipment provider to reacquire up to 6% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares buyback plans are typically an indication that the company’s leadership believes its shares are undervalued.

Insider Activity

In other news, EVP Thimaya K. Subaiya sold 3,042 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, December 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $59.19, for a total transaction of $180,055.98. Following the completion of the sale, the executive vice president now directly owns 207,798 shares in the company, valued at approximately $12,299,563.62. This represents a 1.44 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, SVP Maria Victoria Wong sold 586 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, December 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $58.69, for a total value of $34,392.34. Following the completion of the sale, the senior vice president now directly owns 50,767 shares in the company, valued at $2,979,515.23. This trade represents a 1.14 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 74,848 shares of company stock worth $4,767,206 in the last 90 days. Corporate insiders own 0.01% of the company’s stock.

Cisco Systems Company Profile

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.