JPMorgan Chase & Co. Upgrades Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) to Overweight

JPMorgan Chase & Co. upgraded shares of Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) from a neutral rating to an overweight rating in a research note published on Monday morning, Marketbeat.com reports. They currently have $66.00 target price on the network equipment provider’s stock, up from their previous target price of $55.00.

Several other equities research analysts also recently issued reports on CSCO. Rosenblatt Securities upped their price target on Cisco Systems from $56.00 to $58.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday, August 15th. Jefferies Financial Group reduced their target price on shares of Cisco Systems from $56.00 to $53.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, August 15th. Citigroup raised shares of Cisco Systems from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and raised their price target for the company from $52.00 to $62.00 in a research report on Wednesday, October 16th. Evercore ISI upped their price objective on shares of Cisco Systems from $55.00 to $60.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Friday, September 20th. Finally, StockNews.com cut shares of Cisco Systems from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Tuesday, November 5th. Twelve investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, ten have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $57.32.

Cisco Systems Price Performance

Shares of CSCO opened at $59.18 on Monday. Cisco Systems has a 12-month low of $44.50 and a 12-month high of $59.38. The stock has a market cap of $236.17 billion, a P/E ratio of 23.30, a P/E/G ratio of 4.86 and a beta of 0.83. The business’s fifty day moving average is $53.64 and its 200 day moving average is $49.57. The company has a quick ratio of 0.83, a current ratio of 0.91 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.43.

Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, August 14th. The network equipment provider reported $0.87 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.85 by $0.02. The business had revenue of $13.64 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $13.53 billion. Cisco Systems had a return on equity of 27.83% and a net margin of 19.18%. The company’s quarterly revenue was down 10.3% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $1.01 EPS. Sell-side analysts anticipate that Cisco Systems will post 2.89 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Cisco Systems Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, January 22nd. Shareholders of record on Friday, January 3rd will be issued a dividend of $0.40 per share. This represents a $1.60 annualized dividend and a yield of 2.70%. Cisco Systems’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 62.99%.

Insider Transactions at Cisco Systems

In related news, SVP Maria Victoria Wong sold 3,379 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, August 28th. The shares were sold at an average price of $50.36, for a total transaction of $170,166.44. Following the sale, the senior vice president now directly owns 47,182 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,376,085.52. This represents a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. In other Cisco Systems news, EVP Thimaya K. Subaiya sold 1,328 shares of Cisco Systems stock in a transaction dated Thursday, September 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $48.92, for a total transaction of $64,965.76. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president now owns 132,910 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $6,501,957.20. The trade was a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. Also, SVP Maria Victoria Wong sold 3,379 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, August 28th. The stock was sold at an average price of $50.36, for a total transaction of $170,166.44. Following the completion of the sale, the senior vice president now directly owns 47,182 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,376,085.52. The trade was a 0.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 70,529 shares of company stock worth $3,509,049 over the last quarter. Corporate insiders own 0.01% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of Cisco Systems

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of CSCO. BRITISH COLUMBIA INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT Corp increased its holdings in shares of Cisco Systems by 59.3% in the second quarter. BRITISH COLUMBIA INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT Corp now owns 775,559 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock worth $36,847,000 after purchasing an additional 288,775 shares during the period. Citizens Financial Group Inc. RI increased its stake in Cisco Systems by 24.4% in the 2nd quarter. Citizens Financial Group Inc. RI now owns 264,647 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock worth $12,573,000 after acquiring an additional 51,924 shares during the last quarter. Commerzbank Aktiengesellschaft FI raised its holdings in shares of Cisco Systems by 10.9% in the 3rd quarter. Commerzbank Aktiengesellschaft FI now owns 1,658,417 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $88,261,000 after acquiring an additional 162,544 shares in the last quarter. Quintet Private Bank Europe S.A. boosted its position in shares of Cisco Systems by 17.0% during the 3rd quarter. Quintet Private Bank Europe S.A. now owns 635,667 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $33,830,000 after acquiring an additional 92,179 shares during the last quarter. Finally, IRON Financial LLC purchased a new position in shares of Cisco Systems during the third quarter worth about $856,000. Institutional investors own 73.33% of the company’s stock.

Cisco Systems Company Profile

Cisco Systems, Inc designs, manufactures, and sells Internet Protocol based networking and other products related to the communications and information technology industry in the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, the Asia Pacific, Japan, and China. The company also offers switching portfolio encompasses campus switching as well as data center switching; enterprise routing portfolio interconnects public and private wireline and mobile networks, delivering highly secure, and reliable connectivity to campus, data center and branch networks; wireless products include wireless access points and controllers; and compute portfolio including the cisco unified computing system, hyperflex, and software management capabilities, which combine computing, networking, and storage infrastructure management and virtualization.