Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) Raised to Buy at StockNews.com

Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) was upgraded by equities researchers at StockNews.com from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report issued on Thursday.

CSCO has been the topic of a number of other reports. Tigress Financial lifted their price target on shares of Cisco Systems from $76.00 to $78.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Monday, October 14th. Rosenblatt Securities boosted their target price on shares of Cisco Systems from $56.00 to $58.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Thursday, August 15th. HSBC upgraded shares of Cisco Systems from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and lifted their price target for the stock from $46.00 to $58.00 in a research note on Friday, August 16th. Piper Sandler lifted their price target on shares of Cisco Systems from $52.00 to $57.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday. Finally, Evercore ISI lifted their price target on shares of Cisco Systems from $55.00 to $60.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Friday, September 20th. Eleven research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, eleven have assigned a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Cisco Systems has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $59.42.

Cisco Systems Price Performance

Shares of NASDAQ CSCO traded down $1.26 during trading on Thursday, reaching $57.92. The company had a trading volume of 33,738,058 shares, compared to its average volume of 19,104,037. The stock has a market capitalization of $231.14 billion, a PE ratio of 22.80, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 4.86 and a beta of 0.83. Cisco Systems has a twelve month low of $44.50 and a twelve month high of $59.38. The company has a current ratio of 0.91, a quick ratio of 0.83 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.43. The stock has a 50-day moving average price of $53.82 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $49.64.

Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, August 14th. The network equipment provider reported $0.87 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.85 by $0.02. Cisco Systems had a net margin of 19.18% and a return on equity of 27.83%. The business had revenue of $13.64 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $13.53 billion. During the same period last year, the company earned $1.01 earnings per share. The company’s quarterly revenue was down 10.3% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, sell-side analysts predict that Cisco Systems will post 2.89 earnings per share for the current year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Cisco Systems news, CEO Charles Robbins sold 27,143 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, August 16th. The shares were sold at an average price of $49.45, for a total value of $1,342,221.35. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 683,403 shares in the company, valued at $33,794,278.35. This represents a 3.82 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, EVP Deborah L. Stahlkopf sold 7,462 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Friday, August 16th. The shares were sold at an average price of $49.41, for a total transaction of $368,697.42. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president now owns 165,580 shares in the company, valued at $8,181,307.80. The trade was a 4.31 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last quarter, insiders have sold 70,529 shares of company stock worth $3,509,049. Company insiders own 0.01% of the company’s stock.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Cisco Systems

Several institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in CSCO. ARGA Investment Management LP boosted its holdings in shares of Cisco Systems by 22.3% in the third quarter. ARGA Investment Management LP now owns 27,986 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $1,489,000 after buying an additional 5,101 shares during the period. Edgestream Partners L.P. raised its position in Cisco Systems by 194.3% during the third quarter. Edgestream Partners L.P. now owns 130,569 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock worth $6,949,000 after acquiring an additional 86,197 shares in the last quarter. Point72 Europe London LLP acquired a new position in shares of Cisco Systems in the third quarter valued at $11,357,000. TRUE Private Wealth Advisors increased its holdings in shares of Cisco Systems by 4.2% in the third quarter. TRUE Private Wealth Advisors now owns 20,516 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $1,092,000 after purchasing an additional 829 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Fred Alger Management LLC increased its holdings in shares of Cisco Systems by 4.7% in the third quarter. Fred Alger Management LLC now owns 105,069 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $5,592,000 after purchasing an additional 4,759 shares during the last quarter. 73.33% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

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.