Cogent Communications (NASDAQ:CCOI) Releases Earnings Results, Beats Expectations By $0.01 EPS

Cogent Communications (NASDAQ:CCOI) released its quarterly earnings data on Thursday. The technology company reported ($1.33) earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of ($1.34) by $0.01, Briefing.com reports. Cogent Communications had a negative return on equity of 32.14% and a net margin of 4.26%. The business had revenue of $257.20 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $258.69 million. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business posted ($1.13) EPS. Cogent Communications’s revenue for the quarter was down 6.6% on a year-over-year basis.

Cogent Communications Stock Performance

Shares of NASDAQ CCOI opened at $83.75 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 4.43, a quick ratio of 2.20 and a current ratio of 2.20. The stock has a 50 day moving average price of $77.38 and a 200 day moving average price of $67.66. The stock has a market capitalization of $4.10 billion, a PE ratio of 92.03 and a beta of 0.40. Cogent Communications has a 52 week low of $50.80 and a 52 week high of $86.76.

Cogent Communications Increases Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, December 6th. Investors of record on Friday, November 22nd will be given a $0.995 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Friday, November 22nd. This represents a $3.98 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 4.75%. This is an increase from Cogent Communications’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.99. Cogent Communications’s payout ratio is currently 432.97%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, VP John B. Chang sold 1,400 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, September 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $71.67, for a total value of $100,338.00. Following the completion of the sale, the vice president now owns 71,580 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $5,130,138.60. This represents a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. In other news, Director Lewis H. Ferguson sold 1,550 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, August 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $72.62, for a total value of $112,561.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director now directly owns 17,748 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,288,859.76. This trade represents a 0.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, VP John B. Chang sold 1,400 shares of Cogent Communications stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, September 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $71.67, for a total value of $100,338.00. Following the transaction, the vice president now owns 71,580 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $5,130,138.60. This represents a 0.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 64,870 shares of company stock valued at $4,716,057 in the last 90 days. 11.40% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of brokerages have weighed in on CCOI. Royal Bank of Canada reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and issued a $74.00 price target on shares of Cogent Communications in a research note on Tuesday, September 3rd. The Goldman Sachs Group boosted their price objective on shares of Cogent Communications from $62.00 to $71.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday, October 4th. KeyCorp increased their target price on Cogent Communications from $80.00 to $90.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Tuesday, August 27th. TD Cowen boosted their price target on Cogent Communications from $78.00 to $82.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, August 9th. Finally, Bank of America downgraded Cogent Communications from a “neutral” rating to an “underperform” rating and decreased their price objective for the stock from $75.00 to $65.00 in a report on Wednesday, August 21st. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, two have issued a hold rating and four have given a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $77.14.

About Cogent Communications

Cogent Communications Holdings, Inc, through its subsidiaries, provides high-speed Internet access, private network, and data center colocation space services in North America, Europe, Oceania, South America, and Africa. The company offers on-net Internet access and private network services to law firms, financial services firms, and advertising and marketing firms, as well as heath care providers, educational institutions and other professional services businesses, other Internet service providers, telephone companies, cable television companies, web hosting companies, media service providers, mobile phone operators, content delivery network companies, and commercial content and application service providers.