Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) Lifted to Buy at Citigroup

Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) was upgraded by investment analysts at Citigroup from a “sell” rating to a “buy” rating in a report released on Monday, MarketBeat reports. The firm currently has a $68.00 price objective on the communications equipment provider’s stock, up from their prior price objective of $44.00. Citigroup’s price target indicates a potential upside of 12.34% from the company’s previous close.

CIEN has been the subject of several other research reports. Northland Securities reaffirmed a “market perform” rating and issued a $46.00 target price on shares of Ciena in a research report on Tuesday, September 3rd. Morgan Stanley upped their target price on Ciena from $55.00 to $60.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, September 4th. Rosenblatt Securities boosted their price target on Ciena from $54.00 to $60.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday, September 5th. B. Riley cut their price target on Ciena from $68.00 to $66.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, June 7th. Finally, Stifel Nicolaus boosted their price target on Ciena from $62.00 to $68.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, September 3rd. Four analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and ten have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $61.00.

Ciena Price Performance

Shares of NYSE:CIEN opened at $60.53 on Monday. The company has a market cap of $8.70 billion, a P/E ratio of 58.20, a P/E/G ratio of 6.86 and a beta of 0.94. The company has a quick ratio of 2.99, a current ratio of 4.06 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.53. Ciena has a 52 week low of $39.94 and a 52 week high of $63.24. The business has a fifty day simple moving average of $53.09 and a 200-day simple moving average of $49.79.

Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, September 4th. The communications equipment provider reported $0.35 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.26 by $0.09. Ciena had a return on equity of 5.98% and a net margin of 3.44%. The firm had revenue of $942.30 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $928.31 million. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $0.36 earnings per share. The firm’s quarterly revenue was down 11.8% compared to the same quarter last year. Equities research analysts forecast that Ciena will post 1.15 EPS for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling at Ciena

In other Ciena news, SVP Jason Phipps sold 2,712 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, July 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $48.29, for a total transaction of $130,962.48. Following the sale, the senior vice president now owns 96,000 shares in the company, valued at $4,635,840. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. In other news, SVP Jason Phipps sold 2,712 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, July 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $48.29, for a total transaction of $130,962.48. Following the sale, the senior vice president now directly owns 96,000 shares in the company, valued at approximately $4,635,840. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, SVP David M. Rothenstein sold 3,500 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, July 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $48.81, for a total value of $170,835.00. Following the sale, the senior vice president now owns 212,421 shares in the company, valued at $10,368,269.01. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 9,712 shares of company stock worth $498,637 over the last quarter. 0.83% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Trading of Ciena

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Sanctuary Advisors LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Ciena during the 2nd quarter worth approximately $221,000. LHM Inc. grew its holdings in Ciena by 64.0% in the 2nd quarter. LHM Inc. now owns 83,725 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $4,034,000 after buying an additional 32,668 shares in the last quarter. Truist Financial Corp grew its holdings in Ciena by 10.4% in the 2nd quarter. Truist Financial Corp now owns 29,614 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $1,427,000 after buying an additional 2,800 shares in the last quarter. Quarry LP grew its holdings in Ciena by 118.9% in the 2nd quarter. Quarry LP now owns 1,572 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $76,000 after buying an additional 854 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Creative Planning grew its holdings in Ciena by 13.7% in the 2nd quarter. Creative Planning now owns 8,799 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $424,000 after buying an additional 1,062 shares in the last quarter. 91.99% of the stock is currently 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.