Ciena Co. (NYSE:CIEN) Sees Large Increase in Short Interest

Ciena Co. (NYSE:CIEN) saw a significant growth in short interest during the month of August. As of August 31st, there was short interest totalling 5,750,000 shares, a growth of 19.0% from the August 15th total of 4,830,000 shares. Currently, 4.1% of the shares of the stock are short sold. Based on an average daily volume of 1,560,000 shares, the short-interest ratio is currently 3.7 days.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, SVP David M. Rothenstein sold 3,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, July 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $48.81, for a total transaction of $170,835.00. Following the sale, the senior vice president now directly owns 212,421 shares in the company, valued at approximately $10,368,269.01. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. In other news, SVP David M. Rothenstein sold 3,500 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, July 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $48.81, for a total transaction of $170,835.00. Following the transaction, the senior vice president now owns 212,421 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $10,368,269.01. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, SVP Jason Phipps sold 2,712 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Monday, July 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $48.29, for a total value of $130,962.48. Following the completion of the sale, the senior vice president now owns 96,000 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $4,635,840. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 0.83% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several large investors have recently modified their holdings of CIEN. Private Advisor Group LLC purchased a new stake in Ciena in the fourth quarter valued at about $238,000. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. grew its position in Ciena by 2.0% during the 4th quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 949,476 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $42,736,000 after purchasing an additional 18,860 shares during the last quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP increased its stake in Ciena by 18.1% during the 4th quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 2,162,410 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $97,331,000 after purchasing an additional 332,181 shares in the last quarter. Vanguard Personalized Indexing Management LLC lifted its stake in shares of Ciena by 114.8% during the fourth quarter. Vanguard Personalized Indexing Management LLC now owns 17,875 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $805,000 after buying an additional 9,554 shares during the period. Finally, Norges Bank purchased a new stake in shares of Ciena during the fourth quarter valued at $73,476,000. Institutional investors own 91.99% of the company’s stock.

Ciena Stock Up 3.0 %

Ciena stock traded up $1.64 during mid-day trading on Friday, reaching $56.17. 1,409,565 shares of the company were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 1,763,932. Ciena has a 12-month low of $39.94 and a 12-month high of $63.24. The business has a fifty day moving average of $51.72 and a 200 day moving average of $49.80. The firm has a market cap of $8.07 billion, a P/E ratio of 54.01, a PEG ratio of 6.86 and a beta of 0.94. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.53, a quick ratio of 2.99 and a current ratio of 4.06.

Ciena (NYSE:CIEN) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, September 4th. The communications equipment provider reported $0.35 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.26 by $0.09. Ciena had a return on equity of 5.98% and a net margin of 3.44%. The company had revenue of $942.30 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $928.31 million. During the same quarter last year, the company earned $0.36 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was down 11.8% compared to the same quarter last year. Research analysts anticipate that Ciena will post 1.15 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several research analysts have issued reports on the company. Rosenblatt Securities boosted their target price on Ciena from $54.00 to $60.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Thursday, September 5th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. dropped their price objective on Ciena from $67.00 to $60.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, May 30th. Raymond James downgraded Ciena from a “strong-buy” rating to an “outperform” rating and decreased their target price for the stock from $59.00 to $54.00 in a research report on Thursday, June 6th. B. Riley lowered their target price on shares of Ciena from $68.00 to $66.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, June 7th. Finally, Northland Securities reaffirmed a “market perform” rating and issued a $46.00 price target on shares of Ciena in a research note on Tuesday, September 3rd. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, four have given a hold rating and nine have issued a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $59.15.

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.