Simon Quick Advisors LLC Grows Stock Position in Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO)

Simon Quick Advisors LLC boosted its position in Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO) by 5.3% during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The fund owned 21,743 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock after buying an additional 1,098 shares during the period. Simon Quick Advisors LLC’s holdings in Cisco Systems were worth $1,287,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other institutional investors also recently bought and sold shares of CSCO. State Street Corp lifted its holdings in shares of Cisco Systems by 1.7% in the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 193,489,477 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $10,297,506,000 after buying an additional 3,241,682 shares during the period. Geode Capital Management LLC lifted its holdings in Cisco Systems by 1.3% in the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 95,630,469 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $5,075,320,000 after acquiring an additional 1,262,017 shares during the period. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. boosted its position in shares of Cisco Systems by 2.1% during the 3rd quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 82,720,255 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock worth $4,402,239,000 after purchasing an additional 1,677,383 shares in the last quarter. FMR LLC grew its stake in shares of Cisco Systems by 10.1% during the 3rd quarter. FMR LLC now owns 63,931,461 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock worth $3,402,432,000 after purchasing an additional 5,885,879 shares during the period. Finally, Legal & General Group Plc increased its holdings in shares of Cisco Systems by 3.3% in the 2nd quarter. Legal & General Group Plc now owns 47,593,944 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $2,261,185,000 after purchasing an additional 1,530,468 shares in the last quarter. 73.33% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several research analysts have weighed in on the stock. Citigroup upped their target price on shares of Cisco Systems from $64.00 to $68.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, January 17th. UBS Group raised their price objective on Cisco Systems from $55.00 to $62.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday, November 14th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upgraded Cisco Systems from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and boosted their target price for the stock from $55.00 to $66.00 in a research report on Monday, November 11th. Tigress Financial raised their price target on Cisco Systems from $76.00 to $78.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Monday, October 14th. Finally, Melius upgraded shares of Cisco Systems from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and boosted their price objective for the stock from $66.00 to $73.00 in a research report on Monday, January 6th. Eight equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twelve have issued a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $61.50.

Cisco Systems Trading Up 1.3 %

NASDAQ CSCO opened at $61.03 on Wednesday. The company has a 50-day moving average of $58.94 and a 200-day moving average of $53.70. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.43, a current ratio of 0.88 and a quick ratio of 0.80. Cisco Systems, Inc. has a 12 month low of $44.50 and a 12 month high of $61.33. The company has a market cap of $243.07 billion, a P/E ratio of 26.19, a P/E/G ratio of 4.48 and a beta of 0.84.

Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, November 13th. The network equipment provider reported $0.91 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.87 by $0.04. Cisco Systems had a net margin of 17.73% and a return on equity of 25.70%. The company had revenue of $13.84 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $13.78 billion. During the same quarter last year, the firm posted $0.98 earnings per share. Cisco Systems’s revenue was down 5.6% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, equities analysts predict that Cisco Systems, Inc. will post 2.97 earnings per share for the current year.

Cisco Systems Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, January 22nd. Shareholders of record on Friday, January 3rd will be given a dividend of $0.40 per share. This represents a $1.60 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 2.62%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, January 3rd. Cisco Systems’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 68.67%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, CEO Charles Robbins sold 171,744 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, November 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $57.49, for a total value of $9,873,562.56. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 783,786 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $45,059,857.14. This represents a 17.97 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, EVP Thimaya K. Subaiya sold 21,230 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, November 20th. The shares were sold at an average price of $57.07, for a total transaction of $1,211,596.10. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president now directly owns 213,834 shares in the company, valued at approximately $12,203,506.38. This represents a 9.03 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 353,522 shares of company stock worth $20,349,721 over the last three months. 0.01% of the stock is owned by insiders.

About Cisco Systems

Cisco Systems, Inc designs, manufactures, and sells Internet Protocol based networking and other products related to the communications and information technology industry in the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, the Asia Pacific, Japan, and China. The company also offers switching portfolio encompasses campus switching as well as data center switching; enterprise routing portfolio interconnects public and private wireline and mobile networks, delivering highly secure, and reliable connectivity to campus, data center and branch networks; wireless products include wireless access points and controllers; and compute portfolio including the cisco unified computing system, hyperflex, and software management capabilities, which combine computing, networking, and storage infrastructure management and virtualization.