Ciena Co. (NYSE:CIEN) CEO Sells $543,252.00 in Stock

Ciena Co. (NYSE:CIEN) CEO Gary B. Smith sold 6,800 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, May 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $79.89, for a total value of $543,252.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 362,080 shares in the company, valued at $28,926,571.20. The trade was a 1.84% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink.

Ciena Stock Down 0.5%

NYSE:CIEN traded down $0.40 during trading hours on Monday, reaching $80.84. 468,482 shares of the company traded hands, compared to its average volume of 2,029,455. Ciena Co. has a 1 year low of $44.69 and a 1 year high of $101.44. The business’s 50-day moving average price is $65.40 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $74.70. The company has a current ratio of 3.55, a quick ratio of 2.72 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.54. The stock has a market capitalization of $11.49 billion, a P/E ratio of 141.83, a P/E/G ratio of 1.54 and a beta of 1.11.

Institutional Trading of Ciena

A number of hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of CIEN. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its holdings in Ciena by 0.9% during the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 15,316,640 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $1,299,004,000 after purchasing an additional 139,941 shares during the period. Barrow Hanley Mewhinney & Strauss LLC grew its holdings in Ciena by 0.3% during the fourth quarter. Barrow Hanley Mewhinney & Strauss LLC now owns 5,236,920 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $444,143,000 after purchasing an additional 17,447 shares during the period. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD grew its holdings in Ciena by 195.9% during the fourth quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 4,626,153 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $392,345,000 after purchasing an additional 3,062,883 shares during the period. Bank of America Corp DE grew its holdings in Ciena by 1.6% during the fourth quarter. Bank of America Corp DE now owns 3,227,020 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $273,684,000 after purchasing an additional 49,996 shares during the period. Finally, Geode Capital Management LLC grew its holdings in Ciena by 0.5% during the fourth quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 2,419,947 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $205,301,000 after purchasing an additional 11,933 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 91.99% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several equities analysts have issued reports on the company. Northland Capmk raised Ciena from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, March 12th. Morgan Stanley dropped their price target on Ciena from $80.00 to $76.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, March 12th. Citigroup dropped their price target on Ciena from $98.00 to $75.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Monday, April 14th. Northland Securities raised Ciena from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and upped their target price for the stock from $60.00 to $75.00 in a research report on Wednesday, March 12th. Finally, Barclays set a $100.00 target price on Ciena and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, March 12th. Four research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, nine have assigned a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $77.62.

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.