Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO) Receives Consensus Recommendation of “Moderate Buy” from Analysts

Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO) has earned an average recommendation of “Moderate Buy” from the twenty-one ratings firms that are currently covering the company, Marketbeat reports. Eight research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, eleven have given a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the company. The average 12-month target price among brokerages that have covered the stock in the last year is $61.50.

CSCO has been the topic of several research analyst reports. Tigress Financial raised their target price on Cisco Systems from $76.00 to $78.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Monday, October 14th. Citigroup boosted their price objective on shares of Cisco Systems from $64.00 to $68.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, January 17th. Barclays increased their target price on shares of Cisco Systems from $49.00 to $56.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Thursday, November 14th. Melius Research raised shares of Cisco Systems from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Monday, January 6th. Finally, Morgan Stanley raised their price objective on Cisco Systems from $62.00 to $68.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Tuesday, December 17th.

Cisco Systems Trading Up 1.3 %

NASDAQ CSCO opened at $61.03 on Friday. Cisco Systems has a 52 week low of $44.50 and a 52 week high of $61.33. The firm has a 50 day moving average of $58.94 and a two-hundred day moving average of $53.70. The stock has a market capitalization of $243.07 billion, a PE ratio of 26.19, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 4.48 and a beta of 0.84. The company has a quick ratio of 0.80, a current ratio of 0.88 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.43.

Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, November 13th. The network equipment provider reported $0.91 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.87 by $0.04. The firm had revenue of $13.84 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $13.78 billion. Cisco Systems had a return on equity of 25.70% and a net margin of 17.73%. Cisco Systems’s revenue for the quarter was down 5.6% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company posted $0.98 earnings per share. As a group, research analysts expect that Cisco Systems will post 2.97 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Cisco Systems Announces Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, January 22nd. Investors of record on Friday, January 3rd will be issued a dividend of $0.40 per share. This represents a $1.60 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.62%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, January 3rd. Cisco Systems’s dividend payout ratio is presently 68.67%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Cisco Systems

In other news, 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 transaction of $9,873,562.56. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 783,786 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $45,059,857.14. This represents a 17.97 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, EVP Deborah L. Stahlkopf sold 58,188 shares of Cisco Systems stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, November 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $57.49, for a total value of $3,345,228.12. Following the completion of the sale, the executive vice president now owns 219,100 shares in the company, valued at approximately $12,596,059. This trade represents a 20.98 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last three months, insiders have sold 353,522 shares of company stock valued at $20,349,721. 0.01% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Institutional Trading of Cisco Systems

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Quest Partners LLC purchased a new stake in Cisco Systems during the second quarter worth $62,000. Blair William & Co. IL raised its stake in shares of Cisco Systems by 9.2% during the 2nd quarter. Blair William & Co. IL now owns 697,285 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock worth $33,128,000 after buying an additional 58,987 shares during the last quarter. Seven Eight Capital LP purchased a new stake in shares of Cisco Systems in the 2nd quarter worth about $242,000. Sienna Gestion grew its stake in Cisco Systems by 41.2% in the 2nd quarter. Sienna Gestion now owns 310,525 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $14,746,000 after acquiring an additional 90,610 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Altrius Capital Management Inc increased its holdings in Cisco Systems by 10.6% during the 2nd quarter. Altrius Capital Management Inc now owns 95,579 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $4,541,000 after acquiring an additional 9,127 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds 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.