Gary B. Smith Sells 4,166 Shares of Ciena Co. (NYSE:CIEN) Stock

Ciena Co. (NYSE:CIEN) CEO Gary B. Smith sold 4,166 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, April 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $44.80, for a total value of $186,636.80. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 385,109 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $17,252,883.20. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link.

Ciena Stock Down 0.6 %

CIEN opened at $44.78 on Thursday. Ciena Co. has a fifty-two week low of $39.94 and a fifty-two week high of $63.24. The business has a 50-day moving average of $52.30 and a 200-day moving average of $48.22. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.53, a current ratio of 4.29 and a quick ratio of 3.12. The company has a market capitalization of $6.48 billion, a PE ratio of 29.08, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.03 and a beta of 0.99.

Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, March 7th. The communications equipment provider reported $0.66 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.48 by $0.18. Ciena had a return on equity of 9.92% and a net margin of 5.22%. The company had revenue of $1.04 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.02 billion. During the same period last year, the business earned $0.48 EPS. The business’s quarterly revenue was down 1.8% on a year-over-year basis. Equities research analysts forecast that Ciena Co. will post 1.46 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Kapitalo Investimentos Ltda acquired a new stake in Ciena in the 4th quarter worth approximately $30,000. Register Financial Advisors LLC bought a new position in shares of Ciena in the first quarter valued at approximately $33,000. Farther Finance Advisors LLC raised its position in shares of Ciena by 63.9% in the second quarter. Farther Finance Advisors LLC now owns 849 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $36,000 after purchasing an additional 331 shares during the period. Sunbelt Securities Inc. bought a new position in Ciena during the first quarter worth $59,000. Finally, Johnson Financial Group Inc. bought a new position in Ciena during the fourth quarter worth $61,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 91.99% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several brokerages have recently commented on CIEN. Needham & Company LLC upped their target price on Ciena from $60.00 to $65.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Monday, March 4th. Evercore ISI upped their target price on Ciena from $57.00 to $63.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Friday, February 23rd. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upped their target price on Ciena from $56.00 to $67.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Tuesday, March 5th. BNP Paribas began coverage on Ciena in a research note on Thursday, April 11th. They issued an “outperform” rating and a $57.00 price objective for the company. Finally, StockNews.com raised Ciena from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Friday, March 8th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, two have issued a hold rating, eight have given a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Ciena has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $58.79.

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.