Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) Cut to Hold at Wall Street Zen

Wall Street Zen lowered shares of Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) from a buy rating to a hold rating in a research note released on Saturday morning.

Other analysts have also issued reports about the stock. Northland Capmk raised shares of Ciena from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, March 12th. Needham & Company LLC reaffirmed a “buy” rating and set a $90.00 price objective on shares of Ciena in a research report on Friday. Northland Securities set a $85.00 price objective on shares of Ciena in a research report on Friday. Rosenblatt Securities raised their price objective on shares of Ciena from $65.00 to $85.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Tuesday, June 3rd. Finally, Morgan Stanley raised their price objective on shares of Ciena from $44.00 to $73.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Friday. Six investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, eight have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, Ciena has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $83.15.

Ciena Trading Down 0.4%

Shares of Ciena stock opened at $72.46 on Friday. The company has a quick ratio of 2.72, a current ratio of 3.55 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.54. The firm has a market cap of $10.30 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 127.12, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.54 and a beta of 1.12. The business has a fifty day simple moving average of $70.22 and a 200-day simple moving average of $75.98. Ciena has a fifty-two week low of $44.69 and a fifty-two week high of $101.44.

Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, June 5th. The communications equipment provider reported $0.42 earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.50 by ($0.08). Ciena had a net margin of 2.09% and a return on equity of 4.72%. The company had revenue of $1.13 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.09 billion. During the same quarter last year, the business earned $0.27 EPS. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 23.6% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, equities analysts forecast that Ciena will post 1.6 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling at Ciena

In related news, SVP Brodie Gage sold 350 shares of Ciena stock in a transaction dated Thursday, May 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $78.67, for a total value of $27,534.50. Following the completion of the transaction, the senior vice president now directly owns 46,233 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $3,637,150.11. The trade was a 0.75% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. Also, CEO Gary B. Smith sold 6,800 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, March 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $65.18, for a total transaction of $443,224.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 391,749 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $25,534,199.82. The trade was a 1.71% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 51,788 shares of company stock valued at $3,431,319 in the last 90 days. 0.93% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the company. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD boosted its holdings in Ciena by 195.9% in the fourth quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 4,626,153 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $392,345,000 after acquiring an additional 3,062,883 shares during the last quarter. Nuveen LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Ciena during the 1st quarter worth approximately $70,065,000. Polar Capital Holdings Plc raised its stake in shares of Ciena by 113.7% during the fourth quarter. Polar Capital Holdings Plc now owns 2,169,406 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $183,987,000 after buying an additional 1,154,260 shares during the last quarter. Marshall Wace LLP lifted its holdings in Ciena by 4,215.9% in the fourth quarter. Marshall Wace LLP now owns 899,828 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $76,314,000 after buying an additional 878,979 shares during the period. Finally, Woodline Partners LP bought a new position in Ciena in the first quarter valued at approximately $49,221,000. 91.99% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Ciena Company Profile

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.