Juniper Networks (NYSE:JNPR) Given Hold Rating at Needham & Company LLC

Needham & Company LLC reaffirmed their hold rating on shares of Juniper Networks (NYSE:JNPR) in a report issued on Friday, Benzinga reports.

JNPR has been the topic of a number of other research reports. Barclays boosted their price objective on Juniper Networks from $40.00 to $41.00 and gave the stock an equal weight rating in a research note on Friday, April 26th. StockNews.com began coverage on Juniper Networks in a research note on Monday, July 22nd. They issued a hold rating on the stock. Finally, Argus raised Juniper Networks from a hold rating to a buy rating and set a $40.00 price objective on the stock in a research note on Tuesday, June 18th. Nine investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and one has issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, Juniper Networks presently has an average rating of Hold and an average price target of $36.25.

Juniper Networks Trading Up 1.0 %

Shares of JNPR stock opened at $37.64 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.36, a quick ratio of 1.23 and a current ratio of 1.69. Juniper Networks has a 1 year low of $24.87 and a 1 year high of $38.04. The stock has a fifty day moving average of $36.05 and a two-hundred day moving average of $36.36. The firm has a market capitalization of $12.23 billion, a PE ratio of 54.55, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 9.70 and a beta of 0.95.

Juniper Networks (NYSE:JNPR) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, July 25th. The network equipment provider reported $0.31 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.44 by ($0.13). Juniper Networks had a return on equity of 8.02% and a net margin of 4.58%. The business had revenue of $1.19 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.25 billion. During the same quarter last year, the firm posted $0.42 EPS. The company’s revenue was down 16.8% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, research analysts expect that Juniper Networks will post 1.08 EPS for the current year.

Juniper Networks Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, September 23rd. Stockholders of record on Monday, September 2nd will be given a dividend of $0.22 per share. This represents a $0.88 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.34%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, August 30th. Juniper Networks’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 127.54%.

Insider Transactions at Juniper Networks

In other news, CEO Rami Rahim sold 5,555 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, May 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $34.83, for a total transaction of $193,480.65. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 997,874 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $34,755,951.42. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. In other news, CEO Rami Rahim sold 5,555 shares of Juniper Networks stock in a transaction on Wednesday, May 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $34.83, for a total transaction of $193,480.65. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 997,874 shares in the company, valued at $34,755,951.42. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this link. Also, CFO Kenneth Bradley Miller sold 40,000 shares of Juniper Networks stock in a transaction on Thursday, June 27th. The shares were sold at an average price of $36.00, for a total value of $1,440,000.00. Following the transaction, the chief financial officer now owns 29,435 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,059,660. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 145,889 shares of company stock valued at $5,243,973 over the last three months. Company insiders own 1.28% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of JNPR. GAMMA Investing LLC purchased a new position in shares of Juniper Networks during the fourth quarter valued at $28,000. Hartford Financial Management Inc. grew its stake in Juniper Networks by 51.3% in the fourth quarter. Hartford Financial Management Inc. now owns 973 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $29,000 after purchasing an additional 330 shares in the last quarter. OFI Invest Asset Management purchased a new position in Juniper Networks in the second quarter valued at about $31,000. Johnson Financial Group Inc. purchased a new position in Juniper Networks in the fourth quarter valued at about $35,000. Finally, Blue Trust Inc. grew its stake in Juniper Networks by 34.4% in the fourth quarter. Blue Trust Inc. now owns 1,439 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $40,000 after purchasing an additional 368 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 91.95% of the company’s stock.

Juniper Networks Company Profile

Juniper Networks, Inc designs, develops, and sells network products and services worldwide. The company offers routing products, such as ACX series universal access routers to deploy high-bandwidth services; MX series Ethernet routers that function as a universal edge platform; PTX series packet transport routers; wide-area network SDN controllers; and session smart routers.