Daiwa Securities Group Inc. Buys 68,091 Shares of Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO)

Daiwa Securities Group Inc. increased its stake in shares of Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO) by 6.7% in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The fund owned 1,080,404 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 68,091 shares during the quarter. Daiwa Securities Group Inc.’s holdings in Cisco Systems were worth $63,960,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently bought and sold shares of the stock. FWG Holdings LLC increased its stake in Cisco Systems by 15.5% in the 4th quarter. FWG Holdings LLC now owns 11,163 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock worth $681,000 after acquiring an additional 1,498 shares during the last quarter. Moran Wealth Management LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Cisco Systems by 11.2% in the 4th quarter. Moran Wealth Management LLC now owns 532,671 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $31,534,000 after acquiring an additional 53,624 shares during the last quarter. Main Street Research LLC lifted its stake in shares of Cisco Systems by 9.2% in the 4th quarter. Main Street Research LLC now owns 10,998 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $651,000 after purchasing an additional 929 shares during the last quarter. New Insight Wealth Advisors lifted its position in Cisco Systems by 82.3% in the fourth quarter. New Insight Wealth Advisors now owns 7,070 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock worth $419,000 after buying an additional 3,192 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Zurcher Kantonalbank Zurich Cantonalbank increased its position in Cisco Systems by 141.2% during the fourth quarter. Zurcher Kantonalbank Zurich Cantonalbank now owns 2,656,617 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $157,272,000 after acquiring an additional 1,555,117 shares during the last quarter. 73.33% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several brokerages recently commented on CSCO. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upped their price target on shares of Cisco Systems from $69.00 to $73.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Thursday, February 13th. Bank of America upped their price target on shares of Cisco Systems from $60.00 to $72.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, November 14th. Rosenblatt Securities upgraded shares of Cisco Systems from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and lifted their price objective for the company from $66.00 to $80.00 in a report on Thursday, February 13th. Piper Sandler reissued a “neutral” rating on shares of Cisco Systems in a research report on Thursday. Finally, StockNews.com lowered shares of Cisco Systems from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, March 5th. Seven equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fifteen have assigned a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $66.63.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, CEO Charles Robbins sold 31,983 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Friday, February 14th. The shares were sold at an average price of $64.41, for a total transaction of $2,060,025.03. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 736,120 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $47,413,489.20. The trade was a 4.16 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, SVP Maria Victoria Wong sold 586 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, December 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $58.69, for a total value of $34,392.34. Following the completion of the transaction, the senior vice president now owns 50,767 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,979,515.23. This trade represents a 1.14 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 67,348 shares of company stock worth $4,318,181 in the last ninety days. 0.01% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Cisco Systems Stock Performance

Shares of Cisco Systems stock opened at $63.94 on Monday. Cisco Systems, Inc. has a one year low of $44.50 and a one year high of $66.50. The company has a market capitalization of $254.37 billion, a PE ratio of 27.92, a P/E/G ratio of 4.16 and a beta of 0.79. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.43, a quick ratio of 0.79 and a current ratio of 0.87. The company has a 50-day simple moving average of $61.63 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $57.44.

Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, February 12th. The network equipment provider reported $0.77 EPS for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.91 by ($0.14). Cisco Systems had a net margin of 16.96% and a return on equity of 26.08%. Research analysts expect that Cisco Systems, Inc. will post 3.04 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Cisco Systems Increases Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, April 23rd. Stockholders of record on Thursday, April 3rd will be given a $0.41 dividend. This is a boost from Cisco Systems’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.40. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, April 3rd. This represents a $1.64 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.56%. Cisco Systems’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 71.62%.

Cisco Systems declared that its Board of Directors has initiated a stock repurchase program on Wednesday, February 12th that permits the company to repurchase $15.00 billion in shares. This repurchase authorization permits the network equipment provider to repurchase up to 6% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock repurchase programs are typically an indication that the company’s leadership believes its stock is undervalued.

Cisco Systems 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.