Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) Stock Rating Lowered by StockNews.com

StockNews.com cut shares of Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) from a strong-buy rating to a buy rating in a research note issued to investors on Wednesday.

A number of other equities analysts have also recently commented on CSCO. Barclays raised their target price on Cisco Systems from $56.00 to $61.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a report on Thursday, February 13th. Melius Research upgraded Cisco Systems from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Monday, January 6th. Melius upgraded Cisco Systems from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and lifted their price objective for the company from $66.00 to $73.00 in a research note on Monday, January 6th. The Goldman Sachs Group lifted their price objective on Cisco Systems from $56.00 to $63.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday, February 13th. Finally, DZ Bank upgraded Cisco Systems from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, February 18th. Seven analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fifteen have issued a buy rating and two have issued a strong buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $66.63.

Cisco Systems Stock Performance

Shares of Cisco Systems stock opened at $63.94 on Wednesday. Cisco Systems has a 52 week low of $44.50 and a 52 week high of $66.50. The business’s fifty day simple moving average is $61.63 and its 200-day simple moving average is $57.34. The firm has a market cap of $254.37 billion, a PE ratio of 27.92, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 4.16 and a beta of 0.79. The company has a quick ratio of 0.79, a current ratio of 0.87 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.43.

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

Cisco Systems Increases Dividend

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

Cisco Systems declared that its board has approved a stock repurchase program on Wednesday, February 12th that permits the company to buyback $15.00 billion in outstanding shares. This buyback authorization permits the network equipment provider to buy up to 6% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares buyback programs are typically an indication that the company’s leadership believes its stock is undervalued.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, SVP Maria Victoria Wong sold 586 shares of the business’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 value of $34,392.34. Following the transaction, the senior vice president now owns 50,767 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,979,515.23. The trade was a 1.14 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, EVP Deborah L. Stahlkopf sold 11,808 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, February 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $64.37, for a total value of $760,080.96. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president now directly owns 200,191 shares in the company, valued at approximately $12,886,294.67. The trade was a 5.57 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 67,348 shares of company stock valued at $4,318,181 over the last quarter. Company insiders own 0.01% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the stock. Swedbank AB boosted its stake in shares of Cisco Systems by 0.6% in the third quarter. Swedbank AB now owns 9,029,594 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $480,555,000 after buying an additional 52,711 shares in the last quarter. United Advisor Group LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Cisco Systems in the third quarter valued at approximately $528,000. Hanlon Investment Management Inc. purchased a new stake in shares of Cisco Systems in the third quarter valued at approximately $226,000. Long Run Wealth Advisors LLC boosted its stake in shares of Cisco Systems by 7.2% in the third quarter. Long Run Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 33,559 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $1,786,000 after buying an additional 2,250 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Balentine LLC boosted its position in Cisco Systems by 121.7% during the third quarter. Balentine LLC now owns 11,153 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock worth $594,000 after purchasing an additional 6,123 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 73.33% 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.