Guardian Investment Management Sells 1,625 Shares of Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO)

Guardian Investment Management lowered its stake in Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO) by 6.3% during the third quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The firm owned 24,375 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock after selling 1,625 shares during the period. Guardian Investment Management’s holdings in Cisco Systems were worth $1,297,000 as of its most recent filing with the SEC.

A number of other hedge funds also recently modified their holdings of CSCO. Summit Securities Group LLC bought a new position in shares of Cisco Systems in the second quarter worth $25,000. Quarry LP boosted its stake in Cisco Systems by 222.4% in the second quarter. Quarry LP now owns 661 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $31,000 after buying an additional 456 shares in the last quarter. West Financial Advisors LLC boosted its stake in Cisco Systems by 116.6% in the third quarter. West Financial Advisors LLC now owns 574 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $31,000 after buying an additional 309 shares in the last quarter. Retirement Group LLC boosted its stake in Cisco Systems by 56.8% in the first quarter. Retirement Group LLC now owns 726 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $36,000 after buying an additional 263 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Hobbs Group Advisors LLC acquired a new stake in Cisco Systems in the second quarter valued at about $36,000. Institutional investors own 73.33% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several research firms recently weighed in on CSCO. Jefferies Financial Group reduced their price objective on Cisco Systems from $56.00 to $53.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, August 15th. Evercore ISI lifted their price target on Cisco Systems from $55.00 to $60.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Friday, September 20th. Barclays cut their price target on Cisco Systems from $50.00 to $49.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, August 15th. New Street Research raised Cisco Systems from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $57.00 price target on the stock in a research note on Thursday, August 15th. Finally, Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft lifted their price target on Cisco Systems from $52.00 to $53.00 and gave the company a “hold” rating in a research note on Thursday, August 15th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, fourteen have issued a hold rating, seven have issued a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $55.00.

Cisco Systems Trading Up 1.3 %

Shares of CSCO traded up $0.71 during mid-day trading on Friday, reaching $54.25. 12,704,525 shares of the company were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 19,161,271. The stock has a market capitalization of $216.50 billion, a PE ratio of 21.36, a PEG ratio of 4.22 and a beta of 0.83. The business has a 50 day simple moving average of $50.14 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $48.40. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.43, a quick ratio of 0.83 and a current ratio of 0.91. Cisco Systems, Inc. has a 52 week low of $44.50 and a 52 week high of $54.58.

Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) last issued its earnings results on Wednesday, August 14th. The network equipment provider reported $0.87 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.85 by $0.02. The business had revenue of $13.64 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $13.53 billion. Cisco Systems had a return on equity of 27.83% and a net margin of 19.18%. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was down 10.3% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $1.01 earnings per share. On average, analysts predict that Cisco Systems, Inc. will post 2.9 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Cisco Systems Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, October 23rd. Shareholders of record on Wednesday, October 2nd will be issued a $0.40 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Wednesday, October 2nd. This represents a $1.60 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 2.95%. Cisco Systems’s payout ratio is currently 62.99%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, EVP Deborah L. Stahlkopf sold 7,462 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, August 16th. The stock was sold at an average price of $49.41, for a total transaction of $368,697.42. Following the completion of the sale, the executive vice president now owns 165,580 shares in the company, valued at $8,181,307.80. The trade was a 0.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. In other news, EVP Deborah L. Stahlkopf sold 7,462 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, August 16th. The stock was sold at an average price of $49.41, for a total transaction of $368,697.42. Following the completion of the sale, the executive vice president now owns 165,580 shares in the company, valued at $8,181,307.80. The trade was a 0.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, SVP Maria Victoria Wong sold 3,379 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, August 28th. The shares were sold at an average price of $50.36, for a total value of $170,166.44. Following the sale, the senior vice president now owns 47,182 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,376,085.52. This represents a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last three months, insiders sold 70,529 shares of company stock worth $3,509,049. 0.02% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Cisco Systems Company 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.