Juniper Networks, Inc. (JNPR) To Go Ex-Dividend on March 3rd

Juniper Networks, Inc. (NYSE:JNPR) declared a quarterly dividend on Wednesday, February 5th, Wall Street Journal reports. Shareholders of record on Monday, March 3rd will be paid a dividend of 0.22 per share by the network equipment provider on Monday, March 24th. This represents a $0.88 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 2.43%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, March 3rd.

Juniper Networks has increased its dividend payment by an average of 3.2% per year over the last three years. Juniper Networks has a payout ratio of 39.3% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Research analysts expect Juniper Networks to earn $1.45 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $0.88 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 60.7%.

Juniper Networks Stock Performance

Shares of JNPR stock opened at $36.16 on Friday. The company has a market capitalization of $12.05 billion, a P/E ratio of 42.05, a P/E/G ratio of 2.20 and a beta of 0.87. The business’s 50 day moving average is $37.07 and its two-hundred day moving average is $37.80. The company has a current ratio of 1.46, a quick ratio of 1.14 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.25. Juniper Networks has a 12-month low of $33.72 and a 12-month high of $39.79.

Juniper Networks (NYSE:JNPR) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, February 4th. The network equipment provider reported $0.45 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.58 by ($0.13). Juniper Networks had a return on equity of 7.57% and a net margin of 5.67%. Analysts expect that Juniper Networks will post 1.33 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of brokerages have commented on JNPR. Rosenblatt Securities reissued a “neutral” rating and set a $40.00 target price on shares of Juniper Networks in a report on Friday, November 1st. Argus cut Juniper Networks from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Friday, February 7th. StockNews.com raised Juniper Networks from a “buy” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, February 18th. Evercore ISI raised Juniper Networks from an “in-line” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $40.00 price target for the company in a report on Tuesday, February 4th. Finally, Barclays increased their price target on Juniper Networks from $37.00 to $39.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a report on Wednesday, February 5th. Five equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, one has issued a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $39.80.

Insider Transactions at Juniper Networks

In related news, COO Manoj Leelanivas sold 30,978 shares of Juniper Networks stock in a transaction on Wednesday, February 26th. The stock was sold at an average price of $36.02, for a total value of $1,115,827.56. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief operating officer now directly owns 94,771 shares in the company, valued at approximately $3,413,651.42. This trade represents a 24.63 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Company insiders own 1.28% of the company’s stock.

About Juniper Networks

Juniper Networks, Inc designs, develops, and sells network products and services worldwide. The company offers routing products, such as ACX series universal access routers to deploy high-bandwidth services; MX series Ethernet routers that function as a universal edge platform; PTX series packet transport routers; wide-area network SDN controllers; and session smart routers.