Welch Group LLC Has $8.60 Million Stock Holdings in Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO)

Welch Group LLC boosted its holdings in Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO) by 2.8% in the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The firm owned 145,248 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 3,904 shares during the period. Welch Group LLC’s holdings in Cisco Systems were worth $8,597,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently made changes to their positions in the business. Morse Asset Management Inc acquired a new position in shares of Cisco Systems in the 3rd quarter valued at approximately $798,000. HighVista Strategies LLC acquired a new position in Cisco Systems during the third quarter valued at approximately $1,698,000. GAMMA Investing LLC lifted its stake in Cisco Systems by 13.1% during the fourth quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 93,357 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock worth $5,527,000 after purchasing an additional 10,813 shares during the last quarter. Commerzbank Aktiengesellschaft FI boosted its holdings in shares of Cisco Systems by 10.9% in the 3rd quarter. Commerzbank Aktiengesellschaft FI now owns 1,658,417 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $88,261,000 after purchasing an additional 162,544 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Oddo BHF Asset Management Sas bought a new position in shares of Cisco Systems in the 3rd quarter valued at $502,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 73.33% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

CSCO has been the topic of a number of recent analyst reports. Bank of America lifted their target price on Cisco Systems from $60.00 to $72.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, November 14th. Barclays increased their price objective on shares of Cisco Systems from $49.00 to $56.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Thursday, November 14th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised shares of Cisco Systems from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and boosted their target price for the stock from $55.00 to $66.00 in a research note on Monday, November 11th. Wells Fargo & Company increased their price target on Cisco Systems from $57.00 to $60.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Thursday, November 14th. Finally, Piper Sandler boosted their price objective on Cisco Systems from $52.00 to $57.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Thursday, November 14th. Seven equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, thirteen have assigned a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $62.72.

Insider Activity

In other Cisco Systems news, CFO Richard Scott Herren sold 86,351 shares of Cisco Systems stock in a transaction dated Friday, November 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $57.49, for a total transaction of $4,964,318.99. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer now owns 365,314 shares in the company, valued at approximately $21,001,901.86. The trade was a 19.12 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, CEO Charles Robbins sold 171,744 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, November 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $57.49, for a total value of $9,873,562.56. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 783,786 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $45,059,857.14. This trade represents a 17.97 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 353,522 shares of company stock worth $20,349,721 in the last three months. Company insiders own 0.01% of the company’s stock.

Cisco Systems Stock Up 0.7 %

Shares of NASDAQ:CSCO opened at $61.04 on Tuesday. Cisco Systems, Inc. has a 1 year low of $44.50 and a 1 year high of $62.31. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.43, a current ratio of 0.88 and a quick ratio of 0.80. The business’s 50-day moving average is $59.44 and its 200-day moving average is $54.58. The company has a market capitalization of $243.11 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 26.20, a P/E/G ratio of 4.51 and a beta of 0.84.

Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, November 13th. The network equipment provider reported $0.91 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.87 by $0.04. Cisco Systems had a net margin of 17.73% and a return on equity of 25.70%. The company had revenue of $13.84 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $13.78 billion. During the same quarter last year, the firm posted $0.98 EPS. The company’s quarterly revenue was down 5.6% on a year-over-year basis. Equities research analysts predict that Cisco Systems, Inc. will post 2.97 earnings per share for the current year.

Cisco Systems Announces Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, January 22nd. Stockholders of record on Friday, January 3rd were given a dividend of $0.40 per share. The ex-dividend date was Friday, January 3rd. This represents a $1.60 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.62%. Cisco Systems’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 68.67%.

About Cisco Systems

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.