Kennedy Capital Management LLC Has $1.56 Million Holdings in Ciena Co. (NYSE:CIEN)

Kennedy Capital Management LLC cut its position in shares of Ciena Co. (NYSE:CIEN) by 23.6% in the 1st quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The institutional investor owned 31,444 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock after selling 9,715 shares during the quarter. Kennedy Capital Management LLC’s holdings in Ciena were worth $1,555,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other large investors also recently modified their holdings of the company. Kapitalo Investimentos Ltda bought a new position in shares of Ciena in the fourth quarter valued at $30,000. Register Financial Advisors LLC bought a new position in shares of Ciena in the first quarter valued at $33,000. Headlands Technologies LLC bought a new position in shares of Ciena in the first quarter valued at $40,000. Covestor Ltd lifted its stake in shares of Ciena by 339.5% in the first quarter. Covestor Ltd now owns 1,213 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $60,000 after buying an additional 937 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Johnson Financial Group Inc. bought a new position in shares of Ciena in the fourth quarter valued at $61,000. 91.99% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

CIEN has been the topic of a number of recent research reports. Needham & Company LLC reaffirmed a “buy” rating and issued a $65.00 price objective on shares of Ciena in a research note on Monday, June 3rd. B. Riley lowered their target price on shares of Ciena from $68.00 to $66.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Friday, June 7th. Barclays lowered their target price on shares of Ciena from $63.00 to $55.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Friday, June 7th. Morgan Stanley upgraded shares of Ciena from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and increased their target price for the company from $53.00 to $55.00 in a report on Wednesday, June 12th. Finally, Rosenblatt Securities increased their target price on shares of Ciena from $52.50 to $54.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday, June 7th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have given a hold rating and nine have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $57.25.

Insider Transactions at Ciena

In other news, CEO Gary B. Smith sold 4,166 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, May 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $49.16, for a total value of $204,800.56. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 376,777 shares in the company, valued at approximately $18,522,357.32. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. In related news, SVP David M. Rothenstein sold 3,500 shares of Ciena stock in a transaction on Monday, July 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $48.81, for a total value of $170,835.00. Following the transaction, the senior vice president now owns 212,421 shares in the company, valued at approximately $10,368,269.01. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. Also, CEO Gary B. Smith sold 4,166 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, May 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $49.16, for a total transaction of $204,800.56. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 376,777 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $18,522,357.32. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 15,832 shares of company stock valued at $769,636 in the last quarter. Insiders own 0.83% of the company’s stock.

Ciena Price Performance

CIEN opened at $52.74 on Thursday. The company has a market capitalization of $7.58 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 50.71, a PEG ratio of 5.37 and a beta of 0.95. The company has a quick ratio of 2.76, a current ratio of 3.88 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.53. The firm has a 50-day moving average price of $48.40 and a 200-day moving average price of $50.11. Ciena Co. has a twelve month low of $39.94 and a twelve month high of $63.24.

Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) last released its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, June 6th. The communications equipment provider reported $0.27 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.15 by $0.12. Ciena had a net margin of 3.71% and a return on equity of 7.16%. The company had revenue of $910.80 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $895.80 million. During the same period last year, the business earned $0.59 earnings per share. Ciena’s revenue was down 19.6% compared to the same quarter last year. Equities analysts expect that Ciena Co. will post 1.15 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.