Atlatl Advisers LLC Increases Stock Holdings in Ciena Corporation $CIEN

Atlatl Advisers LLC lifted its stake in Ciena Corporation (NYSE:CIEN) by 5.0% in the 2nd quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The fund owned 6,976 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 335 shares during the quarter. Atlatl Advisers LLC’s holdings in Ciena were worth $567,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Several other large investors have also recently modified their holdings of the stock. William Blair Investment Management LLC raised its position in shares of Ciena by 35.0% in the 2nd quarter. William Blair Investment Management LLC now owns 2,708,540 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $220,286,000 after purchasing an additional 702,909 shares during the last quarter. Ion Asset Management Ltd. increased its holdings in Ciena by 6.3% in the 1st quarter. Ion Asset Management Ltd. now owns 1,356,752 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $81,989,000 after buying an additional 80,426 shares in the last quarter. Vaughan Nelson Investment Management L.P. increased its holdings in Ciena by 375.4% in the 2nd quarter. Vaughan Nelson Investment Management L.P. now owns 1,235,696 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $100,499,000 after buying an additional 975,792 shares in the last quarter. Nuveen LLC bought a new stake in Ciena in the 1st quarter worth about $70,065,000. Finally, Analog Century Management LP increased its holdings in Ciena by 33.0% in the 1st quarter. Analog Century Management LP now owns 841,311 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $50,840,000 after buying an additional 208,509 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 91.99% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several equities research analysts recently commented on the company. Needham & Company LLC lifted their price objective on Ciena from $90.00 to $130.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, September 5th. Bank of America boosted their price target on Ciena from $135.00 to $155.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, September 17th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted their price target on Ciena from $105.00 to $140.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Friday, September 5th. BNP Paribas set a $185.00 price target on Ciena and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Monday, October 13th. Finally, Wolfe Research upgraded Ciena to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, July 8th. Three analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, eleven have assigned a Buy rating and five have issued a Hold rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $137.53.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, CEO Gary B. Smith sold 6,800 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, September 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $92.93, for a total transaction of $631,924.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer directly owned 305,157 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $28,358,240.01. This represents a 2.18% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Also, SVP Joseph Cumello sold 1,863 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, September 26th. The stock was sold at an average price of $141.14, for a total value of $262,943.82. Following the sale, the senior vice president directly owned 43,531 shares in the company, valued at $6,143,965.34. This trade represents a 4.10% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 45,374 shares of company stock valued at $5,936,444 in the last 90 days. 0.93% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Ciena Trading Up 4.0%

Shares of NYSE:CIEN opened at $179.53 on Friday. The stock has a 50 day moving average of $133.51 and a 200 day moving average of $97.31. The company has a current ratio of 3.28, a quick ratio of 2.52 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.55. Ciena Corporation has a 12-month low of $49.21 and a 12-month high of $181.05. The company has a market cap of $25.32 billion, a PE ratio of 185.08, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.48 and a beta of 1.15.

Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, April 6th. The communications equipment provider reported $0.47 EPS for the quarter. Ciena had a return on equity of 6.62% and a net margin of 3.10%.The company had revenue of $844.44 million for the quarter. As a group, equities research analysts expect that Ciena Corporation will post 1.6 EPS for the current year.

About Ciena

Ciena Corporation provides hardware and software services for delivery of video, data, and voice traffic metro, aggregation, and access communications network worldwide. The company’s Networking Platforms segment offers convergence of coherent optical transport, open optical networking, optical transport network switching, IP routing, and switching services.