Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) Sets New 1-Year High – Should You Buy?

Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO) hit a new 52-week high during trading on Thursday . The company traded as high as $79.86 and last traded at $79.6850, with a volume of 3431813 shares trading hands. The stock had previously closed at $78.39.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of research analysts have commented on CSCO shares. UBS Group raised their price target on shares of Cisco Systems from $88.00 to $90.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, November 13th. Hsbc Global Res downgraded Cisco Systems from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Friday, August 15th. Wells Fargo & Company boosted their price target on Cisco Systems from $83.00 to $95.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, November 13th. William Blair upgraded Cisco Systems to a “hold” rating in a research note on Thursday, August 14th. Finally, BNP Paribas Exane boosted their target price on shares of Cisco Systems from $76.00 to $86.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, November 13th. Seventeen investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and nine have assigned a Hold rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Cisco Systems has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $84.14.

Cisco Systems Stock Up 1.3%

The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.49, a quick ratio of 0.91 and a current ratio of 1.00. The stock has a market cap of $312.89 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 30.23, a PEG ratio of 3.00 and a beta of 0.95. The firm’s 50-day simple moving average is $70.49 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $67.90.

Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, November 12th. The network equipment provider reported $1.00 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.98 by $0.02. Cisco Systems had a net margin of 18.45% and a return on equity of 27.06%. The business had revenue of $14.88 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $14.77 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the firm earned $0.91 earnings per share. Cisco Systems’s revenue was up 7.5% compared to the same quarter last year. Cisco Systems has set its FY 2026 guidance at 4.080-4.140 EPS. Q2 2026 guidance at 1.010-1.030 EPS. On average, sell-side analysts expect that Cisco Systems, Inc. will post 3.04 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Cisco Systems Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, January 21st. Stockholders of record on Friday, January 2nd will be paid a dividend of $0.41 per share. This represents a $1.64 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.1%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, January 2nd. Cisco Systems’s dividend payout ratio is 61.65%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, insider Jeetendra I. Patel sold 163,896 shares of Cisco Systems stock in a transaction dated Friday, November 14th. The stock was sold at an average price of $77.86, for a total value of $12,760,942.56. Following the completion of the sale, the insider directly owned 281,108 shares in the company, valued at $21,887,068.88. This trade represents a 36.83% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, SVP Maria Victoria Wong sold 3,162 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, August 25th. The shares were sold at an average price of $67.28, for a total transaction of $212,739.36. Following the transaction, the senior vice president owned 31,468 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,117,167.04. The trade was a 9.13% decrease in their ownership of the stock. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. Insiders have sold 961,950 shares of company stock valued at $74,696,164 over the last 90 days. Corporate insiders own 0.01% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of Cisco Systems

Several institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in CSCO. Norges Bank acquired a new position in shares of Cisco Systems in the second quarter valued at $3,816,825,000. DZ BANK AG Deutsche Zentral Genossenschafts Bank Frankfurt am Main boosted its holdings in shares of Cisco Systems by 413.3% during the 2nd quarter. DZ BANK AG Deutsche Zentral Genossenschafts Bank Frankfurt am Main now owns 22,393,371 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock worth $1,553,645,000 after buying an additional 18,030,441 shares during the period. Kingstone Capital Partners Texas LLC acquired a new position in Cisco Systems in the 2nd quarter valued at about $904,542,000. Franklin Resources Inc. raised its holdings in Cisco Systems by 46.2% in the 2nd quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. now owns 40,836,858 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $2,833,261,000 after acquiring an additional 12,904,969 shares during the period. Finally, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. lifted its position in Cisco Systems by 37.4% during the first quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. now owns 46,973,293 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock worth $2,898,722,000 after acquiring an additional 12,775,066 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors 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.