Generali Investments Towarzystwo Funduszy Inwestycyjnych Sells 2,000 Shares of Ciena Co. (NYSE:CIEN)

Generali Investments Towarzystwo Funduszy Inwestycyjnych reduced its holdings in shares of Ciena Co. (NYSE:CIEN) by 20.0% in the 4th quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 8,000 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock after selling 2,000 shares during the quarter. Generali Investments Towarzystwo Funduszy Inwestycyjnych’s holdings in Ciena were worth $678,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Geode Capital Management LLC boosted its stake in shares of Ciena by 1.4% during the 3rd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 2,408,014 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $148,348,000 after acquiring an additional 33,074 shares during the period. Ritholtz Wealth Management acquired a new position in Ciena in the 4th quarter valued at $245,000. Merit Financial Group LLC acquired a new position in Ciena in the 4th quarter valued at $421,000. Atria Investments Inc acquired a new position in Ciena in the 3rd quarter valued at $1,988,000. Finally, FMR LLC raised its holdings in 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 acquiring an additional 108,407 shares in the last quarter. 91.99% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

CIEN has been the subject of a number of research analyst reports. Citigroup boosted their price target on Ciena from $84.00 to $98.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, December 13th. Rosenblatt Securities upped their price target on Ciena from $75.00 to $94.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday, December 13th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upgraded Ciena from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and upped their target price for the company from $84.00 to $88.00 in a research report on Tuesday, January 28th. Bank of America upgraded Ciena from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and upped their target price for the company from $70.00 to $95.00 in a research report on Friday, December 13th. 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. Six equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and eight have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $78.77.

Insider Transactions at Ciena

In related news, CEO Gary B. Smith sold 6,800 shares of Ciena stock in a transaction on Monday, February 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $84.86, for a total transaction of $577,048.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 412,149 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $34,974,964.14. This trade represents a 1.62 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, SVP Brodie Gage sold 350 shares of Ciena stock in a transaction on Tuesday, February 18th. The shares were sold at an average price of $90.16, for a total value of $31,556.00. Following the sale, the senior vice president now directly owns 49,197 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $4,435,601.52. This represents a 0.71 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 56,642 shares of company stock valued at $4,818,176 over the last three months. Company insiders own 0.93% of the company’s stock.

Ciena Price Performance

Ciena stock opened at $78.08 on Friday. Ciena Co. has a one year low of $43.30 and a one year high of $101.44. The business has a fifty day moving average price of $86.01 and a 200-day moving average price of $71.98. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.54, a current ratio of 3.55 and a quick ratio of 2.72. The firm has a market capitalization of $11.13 billion, a P/E ratio of 136.99, a PEG ratio of 1.54 and a beta of 0.88.

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

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.