Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) Price Target Raised to $305.00

Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) had its target price lifted by Rosenblatt Securities from $175.00 to $305.00 in a research report released on Friday morning,Benzinga reports. They currently have a buy rating on the communications equipment provider’s stock.

A number of other research firms have also issued reports on CIEN. B. Riley restated a “neutral” rating and issued a $113.00 target price (up from $90.00) on shares of Ciena in a report on Friday, September 5th. Zacks Research lowered shares of Ciena from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Monday, November 24th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted their price target on Ciena from $105.00 to $140.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Friday, September 5th. Argus lifted their price objective on Ciena from $100.00 to $135.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, September 5th. Finally, Evercore ISI set a $240.00 target price on Ciena in a research report on Thursday. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, eleven have issued a Buy rating and eight have issued a Hold rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $236.38.

Ciena Price Performance

Shares of NYSE:CIEN opened at $218.82 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.56, a quick ratio of 2.09 and a current ratio of 2.73. The business’s fifty day moving average price is $188.43 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $129.16. The stock has a market cap of $30.87 billion, a PE ratio of 257.43, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.53 and a beta of 1.17. Ciena has a one year low of $49.21 and a one year high of $248.00.

Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, December 11th. The communications equipment provider reported $0.91 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.76 by $0.15. The business had revenue of $1.35 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.29 billion. Ciena had a return on equity of 8.38% and a net margin of 2.59%.The business’s revenue was up 20.1% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the business earned $0.54 earnings per share. On average, analysts forecast that Ciena will post 1.6 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Transactions at Ciena

In other Ciena news, SVP Joseph Cumello sold 1,863 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, September 26th. The stock was sold at an average price of $141.14, for a total transaction of $262,943.82. Following the completion of the sale, the senior vice president directly owned 43,531 shares in the company, valued at $6,143,965.34. This represents a 4.10% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, Director Bruce L. Claflin sold 8,461 shares of Ciena stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, September 24th. The shares were sold at an average price of $140.12, for a total value of $1,185,555.32. Following the completion of the transaction, the director directly owned 54,624 shares in the company, valued at $7,653,914.88. This represents a 13.41% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. Insiders sold a total of 44,785 shares of company stock worth $7,734,906 in the last three months. 0.93% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of the business. Vanguard Group Inc. increased its position in shares of Ciena by 0.7% in the second quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 15,088,445 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $1,227,143,000 after acquiring an additional 103,199 shares in the last quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted its position in Ciena by 23.3% during the 3rd quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 6,462,840 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $941,451,000 after purchasing an additional 1,219,787 shares during the period. Bank of America Corp DE increased its holdings in Ciena by 10.4% in the 2nd quarter. Bank of America Corp DE now owns 3,495,795 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $284,313,000 after purchasing an additional 329,821 shares in the last quarter. William Blair Investment Management LLC increased its holdings in Ciena by 35.0% in the 2nd quarter. William Blair Investment Management LLC now owns 2,708,540 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $220,286,000 after purchasing an additional 702,909 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Lone Pine Capital LLC purchased a new position in Ciena in the third quarter valued at about $292,310,000. 91.99% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

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.