Thrivent Financial for Lutherans Reduces Stock Holdings in Ciena Co. (NYSE:CIEN)

Thrivent Financial for Lutherans cut its holdings in Ciena Co. (NYSE:CIEN) by 4.0% during the 3rd quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The institutional investor owned 2,716,024 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock after selling 113,386 shares during the quarter. Thrivent Financial for Lutherans’ holdings in Ciena were worth $167,280,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other large investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in CIEN. Barrow Hanley Mewhinney & Strauss LLC grew its position in shares of Ciena by 119.9% in the second quarter. Barrow Hanley Mewhinney & Strauss LLC now owns 5,397,560 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $260,054,000 after purchasing an additional 2,943,146 shares during the last quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP grew its holdings in Ciena by 24.0% during the 2nd quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 2,706,308 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $130,392,000 after buying an additional 523,313 shares during the last quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD increased its position in Ciena by 1,944.4% during the first quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 2,062,394 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $101,986,000 after buying an additional 1,961,513 shares in the last quarter. Victory Capital Management Inc. increased its position in Ciena by 17.2% during the second quarter. Victory Capital Management Inc. now owns 2,049,464 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $98,743,000 after buying an additional 301,390 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Pacer Advisors Inc. raised its holdings in shares of Ciena by 7,767.2% in the second quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. now owns 1,966,414 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $94,742,000 after acquiring an additional 1,941,419 shares during the last quarter. 91.99% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Insider Buying and Selling at Ciena

In other Ciena news, SVP David M. Rothenstein sold 3,500 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, September 16th. The stock was sold at an average price of $56.24, for a total value of $196,840.00. Following the transaction, the senior vice president now directly owns 205,421 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $11,552,877.04. This trade represents a 1.68 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, SVP Jason Phipps sold 2,200 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, October 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $61.49, for a total value of $135,278.00. Following the transaction, the senior vice president now owns 91,149 shares in the company, valued at approximately $5,604,752.01. This represents a 2.36 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 9,200 shares of company stock valued at $568,123 over the last ninety days. Corporate insiders own 0.83% of the company’s stock.

Ciena Trading Down 3.6 %

Shares of CIEN opened at $67.22 on Friday. The stock’s fifty day simple moving average is $63.80 and its 200 day simple moving average is $54.63. Ciena Co. has a twelve month low of $42.20 and a twelve month high of $73.47. The company has a current ratio of 4.06, a quick ratio of 2.99 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.53. The firm has a market capitalization of $9.71 billion, a P/E ratio of 71.51, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 5.46 and a beta of 0.94.

Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) last released its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, September 4th. The communications equipment provider reported $0.35 EPS for the quarter, topping 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 company had revenue of $942.30 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $928.31 million. During the same period last year, the business posted $0.36 EPS. The company’s quarterly revenue was down 11.8% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, equities research analysts forecast that Ciena Co. will post 1.13 earnings per share for the current year.

Ciena announced that its board has initiated a share repurchase plan on Wednesday, October 2nd that permits the company to buyback $1.00 billion in outstanding shares. This buyback authorization permits the communications equipment provider to reacquire up to 10.5% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback plans are typically a sign that the company’s leadership believes its stock is undervalued.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

CIEN has been the topic of a number of analyst reports. Stifel Nicolaus increased their price objective on Ciena from $68.00 to $75.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 9th. Barclays lifted their price target on shares of Ciena from $55.00 to $67.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Thursday, September 5th. BNP Paribas downgraded shares of Ciena from an “outperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and upped their price objective for the company from $59.00 to $67.00 in a research note on Wednesday, October 9th. Morgan Stanley cut shares of Ciena from an “overweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating and set a $63.00 target price for the company. in a research note on Monday, October 28th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. lowered Ciena from an “overweight” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $65.00 price target on the stock. in a research note on Monday, October 7th. Eight investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and six have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $63.08.

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.