Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO) Given Consensus Rating of “Moderate Buy” by Brokerages

Shares of Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO) have been given an average rating of “Moderate Buy” by the twenty-one research firms that are covering the stock, Marketbeat.com reports. Ten equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold recommendation, ten have given a buy recommendation and one has issued a strong buy recommendation on the company. The average 12-month price objective among analysts that have updated their coverage on the stock in the last year is $60.28.

CSCO has been the topic of several recent analyst reports. Tigress Financial upped 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. StockNews.com raised shares of Cisco Systems from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, November 14th. Morgan Stanley boosted their price objective on shares of Cisco Systems from $62.00 to $68.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Tuesday, December 17th. UBS Group increased their target price on shares of Cisco Systems from $55.00 to $62.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Thursday, November 14th. Finally, Citigroup boosted their price target on shares of Cisco Systems from $62.00 to $64.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, November 14th.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, Director Kristina M. Johnson sold 7,500 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, December 6th. The stock was sold at an average price of $59.87, for a total value of $449,025.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director now directly owns 65,915 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,946,331.05. This represents a 10.22 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, SVP Maria Victoria Wong sold 4,881 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, November 27th. The stock was sold at an average price of $59.73, for a total transaction of $291,542.13. Following the transaction, the senior vice president now directly owns 51,931 shares in the company, valued at $3,101,838.63. This trade represents a 8.59 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 353,522 shares of company stock valued at $20,349,721 in the last quarter. Insiders own 0.01% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Cisco Systems

A number of institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in CSCO. Legacy Wealth Management LLC MS bought a new stake in shares of Cisco Systems in the 3rd quarter worth approximately $206,000. Birmingham Capital Management Co. Inc. AL lifted its position in Cisco Systems by 9.7% in the third quarter. Birmingham Capital Management Co. Inc. AL now owns 22,320 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock worth $1,188,000 after purchasing an additional 1,970 shares during the period. Logan Capital Management Inc. boosted its stake in Cisco Systems by 10.1% during the third quarter. Logan Capital Management Inc. now owns 295,303 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock worth $15,716,000 after buying an additional 27,175 shares in the last quarter. Retirement Systems of Alabama increased its holdings in Cisco Systems by 3.7% in the 3rd quarter. Retirement Systems of Alabama now owns 3,038,015 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $161,683,000 after buying an additional 109,772 shares during the period. Finally, Oddo BHF Asset Management Sas acquired a new position in shares of Cisco Systems in the 3rd quarter valued at $502,000. 73.33% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Cisco Systems Price Performance

NASDAQ CSCO opened at $58.52 on Monday. Cisco Systems has a 1 year low of $44.50 and a 1 year high of $60.23. The stock’s 50-day moving average price is $57.61 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $51.77. The company has a market cap of $233.07 billion, a PE ratio of 25.12, a PEG ratio of 4.37 and a beta of 0.85. The company has a current ratio of 0.88, a quick ratio of 0.80 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.43.

Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, November 13th. The network equipment provider reported $0.91 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.87 by $0.04. Cisco Systems had a net margin of 17.73% and a return on equity of 25.70%. The business had revenue of $13.84 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $13.78 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm earned $0.98 EPS. The firm’s quarterly revenue was down 5.6% on a year-over-year basis. On average, analysts predict that Cisco Systems will post 2.97 EPS for the current year.

Cisco Systems Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, January 22nd. Investors of record on Friday, January 3rd will be paid a $0.40 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, January 3rd. This represents a $1.60 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 2.73%. Cisco Systems’s payout ratio is presently 68.67%.

Cisco Systems Company Profile

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.