B. Riley Cuts Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) Price Target to $66.00

Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) had its price objective reduced by B. Riley from $68.00 to $66.00 in a research note published on Friday, Benzinga reports. B. Riley currently has a buy rating on the communications equipment provider’s stock.

Several other equities research analysts also recently weighed in on CIEN. Raymond James downgraded Ciena from a strong-buy rating to an outperform rating and cut their price objective for the company from $59.00 to $54.00 in a report on Thursday. Rosenblatt Securities lowered Ciena from a buy rating to a neutral rating and cut their price target for the company from $65.00 to $52.50 in a research note on Thursday, May 30th. BNP Paribas began coverage on Ciena in a research note on Thursday, April 11th. They issued an outperform rating and a $57.00 price objective for the company. JPMorgan Chase & Co. dropped their price objective on shares of Ciena from $67.00 to $60.00 and set an overweight rating for the company in a report on Thursday, May 30th. Finally, Citigroup assumed coverage on shares of Ciena in a report on Friday, April 12th. They set a sell rating and a $44.00 target price on the stock. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have given a hold rating and eight have issued a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of Moderate Buy and a consensus target price of $57.58.

Ciena Stock Down 5.8 %

NYSE CIEN opened at $45.75 on Friday. Ciena has a fifty-two week low of $39.94 and a fifty-two week high of $63.24. The business has a fifty day moving average price of $47.52 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $49.31. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.53, a current ratio of 3.88 and a quick ratio of 3.12. The stock has a market capitalization of $6.62 billion, a PE ratio of 43.99, a PEG ratio of 3.16 and a beta of 0.99.

Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, June 6th. The communications equipment provider reported $0.27 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.15 by $0.12. The firm had revenue of $910.80 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $895.80 million. Ciena had a return on equity of 7.16% and a net margin of 3.71%. The business’s quarterly revenue was down 19.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $0.59 earnings per share. Equities analysts expect that Ciena will post 1.43 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling at Ciena

In other Ciena news, SVP Brodie Gage sold 533 shares of Ciena stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, April 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $49.61, for a total value of $26,442.13. Following the completion of the sale, the senior vice president now directly owns 41,372 shares in the company, valued at $2,052,464.92. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. In related news, SVP Brodie Gage sold 533 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, April 1st. The shares were sold at an average price of $49.61, for a total transaction of $26,442.13. Following the transaction, the senior vice president now directly owns 41,372 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,052,464.92. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, SVP David M. Rothenstein sold 3,500 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Friday, March 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $50.19, for a total transaction of $175,665.00. Following the completion of the sale, the senior vice president now owns 230,001 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $11,543,750.19. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last quarter, insiders have sold 29,307 shares of company stock valued at $1,414,330. 0.83% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in CIEN. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its holdings in Ciena by 1.0% during the third quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 15,084,694 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $712,903,000 after buying an additional 155,964 shares during the last quarter. FMR LLC raised its holdings in shares of Ciena by 4.3% in the 3rd quarter. FMR LLC now owns 8,940,640 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $422,535,000 after acquiring an additional 371,041 shares during the last quarter. BNP Paribas Asset Management Holding S.A. lifted its position in Ciena by 7.9% in the 4th quarter. BNP Paribas Asset Management Holding S.A. now owns 5,021,719 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $226,028,000 after acquiring an additional 368,897 shares in the last quarter. BNP PARIBAS ASSET MANAGEMENT Holding S.A. boosted its stake in Ciena by 8.6% during the 3rd quarter. BNP PARIBAS ASSET MANAGEMENT Holding S.A. now owns 4,652,822 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $219,893,000 after purchasing an additional 366,647 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Capital World Investors increased its holdings in Ciena by 29.1% during the 4th quarter. Capital World Investors now owns 3,513,633 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $158,149,000 after purchasing an additional 791,215 shares in the last quarter. 91.99% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

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.