Jason Phipps Sells 2,200 Shares of Ciena Co. (NYSE:CIEN) Stock

Ciena Co. (NYSE:CIEN) SVP Jason Phipps sold 2,200 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, October 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $61.49, for a total value of $135,278.00. Following the completion of the sale, the senior vice president now directly owns 91,149 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $5,604,752.01. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this link.

Ciena Trading Up 7.4 %

Ciena stock opened at $66.01 on Thursday. The firm has a market cap of $9.49 billion, a PE ratio of 63.47, a P/E/G ratio of 7.93 and a beta of 0.94. Ciena Co. has a 12 month low of $39.94 and a 12 month high of $66.30. The stock’s 50 day simple moving average is $54.57 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $50.28. The company has a current ratio of 4.06, a quick ratio of 2.99 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.53.

Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, September 4th. The communications equipment provider reported $0.35 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.26 by $0.09. Ciena had a net margin of 3.44% and a return on equity of 5.98%. The company had revenue of $942.30 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $928.31 million. During the same quarter last year, the business earned $0.36 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue was down 11.8% on a year-over-year basis. Analysts anticipate that Ciena Co. will post 1.15 earnings per share for the current year.

Ciena announced that its Board of Directors has approved a stock repurchase plan on Wednesday, October 2nd that allows the company to repurchase $1.00 billion in outstanding 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 usually an indication that the company’s management believes its shares are undervalued.

Institutional Trading of Ciena

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the business. SG Americas Securities LLC grew its stake in Ciena by 1,171.4% in the 2nd quarter. SG Americas Securities LLC now owns 44,854 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $2,161,000 after acquiring an additional 41,326 shares during the period. First Hawaiian Bank acquired a new stake in shares of Ciena in the second quarter valued at about $661,000. Bank of New York Mellon Corp grew its position in shares of Ciena by 13.8% in the second quarter. Bank of New York Mellon Corp now owns 1,499,035 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $72,223,000 after purchasing an additional 181,358 shares during the period. Susquehanna Fundamental Investments LLC acquired a new position in shares of Ciena during the 2nd quarter worth about $5,039,000. Finally, Capital Fund Management S.A. lifted its stake in Ciena by 67.3% in the 4th quarter. Capital Fund Management S.A. now owns 225,172 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $10,135,000 after buying an additional 90,610 shares in the last quarter. 91.99% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of analysts recently commented on the stock. Bank of America reiterated a “neutral” rating and issued a $59.00 target price on shares of Ciena in a research note on Thursday, September 5th. Barclays boosted their price objective on shares of Ciena from $55.00 to $67.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Thursday, September 5th. Citigroup upgraded Ciena from a “sell” rating to a “buy” rating and raised their target price for the stock from $44.00 to $68.00 in a research note on Monday, September 23rd. Morgan Stanley boosted their price target on Ciena from $55.00 to $60.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, September 4th. Finally, Northland Securities reissued a “market perform” rating and issued a $46.00 price objective on shares of Ciena in a report on Tuesday, September 3rd. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and ten have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $61.00.

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.