Cisco Systems, Inc. (CSCO) To Go Ex-Dividend on October 2nd

Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO) announced a quarterly dividend on Wednesday, August 14th, Zacks reports. Investors of record on Wednesday, October 2nd will be given a dividend of 0.40 per share by the network equipment provider on Wednesday, October 23rd. This represents a $1.60 annualized dividend and a yield of 3.02%. The ex-dividend date is Wednesday, October 2nd.

Cisco Systems has increased its dividend by an average of 2.7% annually over the last three years and has raised its dividend annually for the last 13 consecutive years. Cisco Systems has a dividend payout ratio of 44.8% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Research analysts expect Cisco Systems to earn $3.14 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $1.60 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 51.0%.

Cisco Systems Stock Performance

CSCO stock opened at $53.02 on Monday. The company has a quick ratio of 0.83, a current ratio of 0.91 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.43. The business’s fifty day simple moving average is $49.01 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $48.14. Cisco Systems has a twelve month low of $44.50 and a twelve month high of $54.58. The firm has a market cap of $213.61 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 17.85, a PEG ratio of 4.11 and a beta of 0.83.

Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, August 14th. The network equipment provider reported $0.87 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.85 by $0.02. The firm had revenue of $13.64 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $13.53 billion. Cisco Systems had a return on equity of 27.83% and a net margin of 19.18%. The business’s revenue for the quarter was down 10.3% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter last year, the firm posted $1.01 earnings per share. Analysts predict that Cisco Systems will post 2.9 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Activity at Cisco Systems

In related news, EVP Deborah L. Stahlkopf sold 7,462 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, August 16th. The stock was sold at an average price of $49.41, for a total value of $368,697.42. Following the sale, the executive vice president now owns 165,580 shares in the company, valued at $8,181,307.80. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. In other Cisco Systems news, SVP Maria Victoria Wong sold 3,379 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, August 28th. The stock was sold at an average price of $50.36, for a total value of $170,166.44. Following the completion of the transaction, the senior vice president now directly owns 47,182 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,376,085.52. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, EVP Deborah L. Stahlkopf sold 7,462 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, August 16th. The shares were sold at an average price of $49.41, for a total value of $368,697.42. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president now directly owns 165,580 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $8,181,307.80. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 70,529 shares of company stock worth $3,509,049 over the last quarter. Insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several equities analysts have recently commented on CSCO shares. Piper Sandler restated a “neutral” rating and set a $52.00 price target on shares of Cisco Systems in a research note on Thursday, August 15th. Jefferies Financial Group cut their price target on Cisco Systems from $56.00 to $53.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, August 15th. Barclays dropped their price objective on Cisco Systems from $50.00 to $49.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, August 15th. HSBC raised Cisco Systems from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and raised their price objective for the company from $46.00 to $58.00 in a research report on Friday, August 16th. Finally, Evercore ISI raised their price objective on Cisco Systems from $55.00 to $60.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Friday, September 20th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, fourteen have assigned a hold rating, seven have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $55.00.

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.