Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) Stock Price Down 5.4% After Analyst Downgrade

Ciena Corporation (NYSE:CIEN)’s stock price fell 5.4% during trading on Tuesday after B. Riley Financial lowered their price target on the stock from $516.00 to $413.00. B. Riley Financial currently has a neutral rating on the stock. Ciena traded as low as $359.28 and last traded at $362.0780. 355,904 shares traded hands during trading, a decline of 88% from the average session volume of 2,854,074 shares. The stock had previously closed at $382.80.

CIEN has been the topic of several other research reports. Argus set a $650.00 target price on Ciena in a research report on Friday, June 5th. Bank of America reissued a “buy” rating on shares of Ciena in a research report on Thursday, August 20th. Zacks Research cut Ciena from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Monday, August 3rd. Northland Securities upgraded shares of Ciena from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and upped their target price for the stock from $450.00 to $500.00 in a research note on Wednesday, August 19th. Finally, Morgan Stanley increased their target price on shares of Ciena from $405.00 to $490.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a report on Friday, June 5th. Fourteen investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and six have given a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $521.22.

Insider Buying and Selling at Ciena

In other Ciena news, SVP Joseph Cumello sold 1,586 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Friday, June 26th. The shares were sold at an average price of $466.33, for a total transaction of $739,599.38. Following the completion of the transaction, the senior vice president owned 42,872 shares in the company, valued at $19,992,499.76. This trade represents a 3.57% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, CEO Gary B. Smith sold 2,952 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, August 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $447.78, for a total transaction of $1,321,846.56. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer directly owned 246,030 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $110,167,313.40. This trade represents a 1.19% decrease in their ownership of the stock. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Over the last 90 days, insiders sold 22,470 shares of company stock valued at $9,967,521. Insiders own 0.58% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of Ciena

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of the company. Corient Private Wealth LP boosted its holdings in Ciena by 0.5% in the 2nd quarter. Corient Private Wealth LP now owns 34,452 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $16,901,000 after purchasing an additional 172 shares during the period. Formuepleje A S bought a new position in shares of Ciena in the second quarter worth $808,000. Advus Financial Partners LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Ciena in the second quarter worth $282,000. Groupe la Francaise purchased a new stake in shares of Ciena in the second quarter worth $11,911,000. Finally, VIRGINIA RETIREMENT SYSTEMS ET Al bought a new stake in Ciena during the second quarter valued at $11,646,000. Institutional investors own 91.99% of the company’s stock.

Ciena Stock Down 5.4%

The company has a 50 day moving average of $414.29 and a 200-day moving average of $437.16. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.53, a current ratio of 2.73 and a quick ratio of 2.11. The company has a market cap of $51.25 billion, a P/E ratio of 120.58 and a beta of 1.30.

Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, June 4th. The communications equipment provider reported $1.64 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.46 by $0.18. The business had revenue of $1.57 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.50 billion. Ciena had a net margin of 7.87% and a return on equity of 18.15%. Ciena’s revenue for the quarter was up 39.5% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $0.42 earnings per share. On average, equities analysts predict that Ciena Corporation will post 5.4 earnings per share for the current year.

About Ciena

Ciena Corporation (NYSE: CIEN) is a global supplier of telecommunications networking equipment, software and services. The company develops high-capacity optical transport systems and packet-optical platforms that enable service providers, cloud operators and large enterprises to build, manage and scale their networks. Ciena’s product portfolio includes coherent optical solutions, packet networking platforms and a suite of network automation software designed to optimize bandwidth, reduce latency and simplify network operations.

In addition to hardware offerings, Ciena provides professional services and support, including network design, implementation and ongoing maintenance.