Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO) Given Average Recommendation of “Moderate Buy” by Analysts

Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO) has been given a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” by the twenty-one brokerages that are presently covering the company, MarketBeat.com reports. Seven analysts have rated the stock with a hold recommendation, twelve have issued a buy recommendation and two have given a strong buy recommendation to the company. The average twelve-month price objective among analysts that have covered the stock in the last year is $62.72.

Several research firms recently issued reports on CSCO. Piper Sandler raised their price target on Cisco Systems from $52.00 to $57.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Thursday, November 14th. Tigress Financial raised their target price on shares of Cisco Systems from $76.00 to $78.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Monday, October 14th. UBS Group upped their price target on shares of Cisco Systems from $55.00 to $62.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday, November 14th. BNP Paribas raised shares of Cisco Systems from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $72.00 price target on the stock in a report on Tuesday, January 28th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. upgraded shares of Cisco Systems from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and increased their target price for the stock from $55.00 to $66.00 in a report on Monday, November 11th.

Cisco Systems Stock Performance

Shares of NASDAQ CSCO opened at $62.81 on Tuesday. The stock has a market cap of $250.16 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 26.96, a P/E/G ratio of 4.63 and a beta of 0.84. The stock’s 50-day moving average is $59.71 and its 200 day moving average is $55.10. 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 has a 1-year low of $44.50 and a 1-year high of $63.25.

Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) last announced its quarterly earnings data 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 firm had revenue of $13.84 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $13.78 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $0.98 EPS. The business’s quarterly revenue was down 5.6% on a year-over-year basis. On average, sell-side analysts anticipate that Cisco Systems will post 2.97 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Cisco Systems Announces Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, January 22nd. Investors of record on Friday, January 3rd were paid a $0.40 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Friday, January 3rd. This represents a $1.60 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.55%. Cisco Systems’s payout ratio is 68.67%.

Insider Activity at Cisco Systems

In other news, EVP Thimaya K. Subaiya sold 3,042 shares of Cisco Systems stock in a transaction dated Thursday, December 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $59.19, for a total value of $180,055.98. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president now owns 207,798 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $12,299,563.62. The trade was a 1.44 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, CFO Richard Scott Herren sold 86,351 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Friday, November 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $57.49, for a total transaction of $4,964,318.99. Following the sale, the chief financial officer now directly owns 365,314 shares in the company, valued at $21,001,901.86. This trade represents a 19.12 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. 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 three months. Company insiders own 0.01% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the company. FPC Investment Advisory Inc. bought a new position in Cisco Systems during the 4th quarter valued at about $26,000. Campbell Capital Management Inc. bought a new stake in Cisco Systems in the 4th quarter worth approximately $31,000. Highline Wealth Partners LLC raised its stake in Cisco Systems by 76.7% during the 4th quarter. Highline Wealth Partners LLC now owns 599 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $35,000 after buying an additional 260 shares during the last quarter. Synergy Investment Management LLC bought a new position in shares of Cisco Systems during the 4th quarter valued at $36,000. Finally, RPg Family Wealth Advisory LLC purchased a new position in shares of Cisco Systems in the 3rd quarter worth $40,000. Institutional investors own 73.33% of the company’s stock.

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.