Arizona State Retirement System Purchases 535 Shares of Ciena Co. (NYSE:CIEN)

Arizona State Retirement System grew its position in Ciena Co. (NYSE:CIEN) by 1.3% during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The fund owned 41,915 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 535 shares during the quarter. Arizona State Retirement System’s holdings in Ciena were worth $3,555,000 as of its most recent filing with the SEC.

Several other large investors also recently modified their holdings of CIEN. FMR LLC lifted its stake in shares of Ciena by 0.5% in the 3rd quarter. FMR LLC now owns 21,664,066 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $1,334,290,000 after purchasing an additional 108,407 shares during the period. State Street Corp increased its holdings in Ciena by 1.2% in the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 4,439,478 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $273,427,000 after purchasing an additional 53,078 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC increased its holdings in Ciena by 1.4% in the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 2,408,014 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $148,348,000 after purchasing an additional 33,074 shares in the last quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. lifted its stake in Ciena by 0.5% in the fourth quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 959,831 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $81,403,000 after buying an additional 4,315 shares during the period. Finally, Point72 Asset Management L.P. bought a new position in shares of Ciena during the 3rd quarter worth approximately $57,861,000. 91.99% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several analysts have recently weighed in on CIEN shares. Rosenblatt Securities lowered their price objective on shares of Ciena from $94.00 to $79.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Friday. Bank of America raised shares of Ciena from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and lifted their price target for the company from $70.00 to $95.00 in a research note on Friday, December 13th. Citigroup upped their price objective on shares of Ciena from $84.00 to $98.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, December 13th. Needham & Company LLC restated a “buy” rating and issued a $95.00 target price on shares of Ciena in a research note on Friday, January 10th. Finally, Barclays upped their price target on Ciena from $67.00 to $97.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Friday, December 13th. Five analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and eight have issued a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Ciena has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $77.62.

Ciena Stock Performance

Shares of CIEN opened at $68.75 on Monday. The firm has a market capitalization of $9.80 billion, a P/E ratio of 120.62, a P/E/G ratio of 1.54 and a beta of 0.91. Ciena Co. has a 52 week low of $43.30 and a 52 week high of $101.44. The stock has a 50 day moving average price of $84.29 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $73.14. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.54, a quick ratio of 2.72 and a current ratio of 3.55.

Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, December 12th. The communications equipment provider reported $0.54 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.66 by ($0.12). The company had revenue of $1.12 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.10 billion. Ciena had a return on equity of 4.72% and a net margin of 2.09%. The company’s quarterly revenue was down .5% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter last year, the company posted $0.56 EPS. Equities analysts forecast that Ciena Co. will post 1.6 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Transactions at Ciena

In other news, CEO Gary B. Smith sold 6,800 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, March 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $76.41, for a total value of $519,588.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 398,549 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $30,453,129.09. This represents a 1.68 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, SVP Brodie Gage sold 350 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, January 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $85.91, for a total value of $30,068.50. Following the sale, the senior vice president now directly owns 49,547 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $4,256,582.77. The trade was a 0.70 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 63,442 shares of company stock worth $5,337,764 in the last quarter. 0.93% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Ciena Profile

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.