Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) Given New $97.00 Price Target at Barclays

Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) had its price target lifted by research analysts at Barclays from $67.00 to $97.00 in a research note issued on Friday,Benzinga reports. The firm currently has an “overweight” rating on the communications equipment provider’s stock. Barclays‘s price objective points to a potential upside of 8.81% from the stock’s current price.

CIEN has been the subject of several other research reports. Rosenblatt Securities upped their price target on shares of Ciena from $60.00 to $75.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Thursday, December 5th. Morgan Stanley lowered Ciena from an “overweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating and set a $63.00 target price on the stock. in a research report on Monday, October 28th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. downgraded Ciena from an “overweight” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $65.00 price target for the company. in a research report on Monday, October 7th. BNP Paribas lowered Ciena from an “outperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and lifted their price objective for the company from $59.00 to $67.00 in a research note on Wednesday, October 9th. Finally, Citigroup boosted their target price on Ciena from $68.00 to $84.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, December 5th. Seven research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and seven have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Ciena currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $75.92.

Ciena Trading Up 5.5 %

Shares of Ciena stock traded up $4.63 during mid-day trading on Friday, hitting $89.15. 1,405,029 shares of the stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 1,824,276. The stock has a market capitalization of $12.88 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 94.20, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 5.95 and a beta of 0.95. Ciena has a twelve month low of $42.20 and a twelve month high of $89.56. The company has a current ratio of 4.06, a quick ratio of 2.99 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.53. The company has a 50-day simple moving average of $68.45 and a 200 day simple moving average of $57.52.

Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, December 12th. The communications equipment provider reported $0.54 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.66 by ($0.12). The firm had revenue of $1.12 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.10 billion. Ciena had a return on equity of 5.98% and a net margin of 3.44%. The firm’s revenue was down .5% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter last year, the business posted $0.56 EPS. Research analysts forecast that Ciena will post 1.13 EPS for the current year.

Ciena declared that its Board of Directors has authorized a stock buyback program on Wednesday, October 2nd that authorizes the company to buyback $1.00 billion in shares. This buyback authorization authorizes the communications equipment provider to purchase up to 10.5% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares buyback programs are generally an indication that the company’s board of directors believes its shares are undervalued.

Insider Transactions at Ciena

In other news, SVP Joseph Cumello sold 1,289 shares of Ciena stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, November 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $68.99, for a total value of $88,928.11. Following the completion of the transaction, the senior vice president now owns 39,486 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,724,139.14. This trade represents a 3.16 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, SVP Jason Phipps sold 2,200 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, October 1st. The shares were sold at an average price of $61.49, for a total value of $135,278.00. Following the sale, the senior vice president now directly owns 91,149 shares in the company, valued at approximately $5,604,752.01. This represents a 2.36 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last 90 days, insiders sold 10,489 shares of company stock valued at $657,051. Insiders own 0.83% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Ciena

Several institutional investors and hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of CIEN. Hoese & Co LLP acquired a new stake in Ciena in the third quarter worth $25,000. UMB Bank n.a. grew its position in shares of Ciena by 424.4% during the third quarter. UMB Bank n.a. now owns 451 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $28,000 after acquiring an additional 365 shares during the last quarter. Canton Hathaway LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Ciena in the 2nd quarter worth about $40,000. First Horizon Advisors Inc. lifted its position in Ciena by 152.8% in the 3rd quarter. First Horizon Advisors Inc. now owns 847 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $52,000 after purchasing an additional 512 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Blue Trust Inc. boosted its stake in Ciena by 241.5% during the 3rd quarter. Blue Trust Inc. now owns 1,424 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $88,000 after purchasing an additional 1,007 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 91.99% of the company’s stock.

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.