Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) Price Target Raised to $72.00 at Wells Fargo & Company

Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) had its price objective boosted by Wells Fargo & Company from $60.00 to $72.00 in a report issued on Thursday,Benzinga reports. Wells Fargo & Company currently has an equal weight rating on the network equipment provider’s stock.

CSCO has been the subject of a number of other research reports. Morgan Stanley boosted their price target on Cisco Systems from $62.00 to $68.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Tuesday, December 17th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upgraded shares of Cisco Systems from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and boosted their target price for the company from $55.00 to $66.00 in a research report on Monday, November 11th. Melius Research raised shares of Cisco Systems from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Monday, January 6th. BNP Paribas raised shares of Cisco Systems from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $72.00 price objective on the stock in a research note on Tuesday, January 28th. Finally, Piper Sandler upped their target price on Cisco Systems from $57.00 to $72.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday. Seven analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fourteen have assigned a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $66.53.

Cisco Systems Stock Performance

NASDAQ CSCO opened at $63.84 on Thursday. Cisco Systems has a 12-month low of $44.50 and a 12-month high of $66.50. The firm has a 50-day moving average price of $59.89 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $55.36. The company has a market capitalization of $254.26 billion, a P/E ratio of 27.40, a P/E/G ratio of 4.63 and a beta of 0.84. The company has a quick ratio of 0.80, a current ratio of 0.88 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.43.

Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, February 12th. The network equipment provider reported $0.77 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.91 by ($0.14). Cisco Systems had a net margin of 17.73% and a return on equity of 25.70%. Analysts anticipate that Cisco Systems will post 2.97 earnings per share for the current year.

Cisco Systems declared that its Board of Directors has approved a share repurchase program on Wednesday, February 12th that allows the company to buyback $15.00 billion in outstanding shares. This buyback authorization allows the network equipment provider to reacquire up to 6% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback programs are usually an indication that the company’s board believes its shares are undervalued.

Cisco Systems Increases Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, April 23rd. Shareholders 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. This represents a $1.64 annualized dividend and a yield of 2.57%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, April 3rd. Cisco Systems’s dividend payout ratio is 68.67%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, SVP Maria Victoria Wong sold 586 shares of Cisco Systems stock in a transaction that occurred 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 transaction, the senior vice president now directly owns 50,767 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,979,515.23. The trade was a 1.14 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, EVP Thimaya K. Subaiya sold 3,042 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, December 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $59.19, for a total transaction of $180,055.98. Following the sale, the executive vice president now directly owns 207,798 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $12,299,563.62. This represents a 1.44 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 37,239 shares of company stock valued at $2,166,612 over the last 90 days. 0.01% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Institutional Trading of Cisco Systems

A number of institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of CSCO. Exchange Traded Concepts LLC boosted its position in shares of Cisco Systems by 57.7% during the 3rd quarter. Exchange Traded Concepts LLC now owns 5,126 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $273,000 after purchasing an additional 1,876 shares in the last quarter. Creative Planning lifted its stake in Cisco Systems by 3.4% in the third quarter. Creative Planning now owns 1,155,964 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $60,979,000 after buying an additional 38,000 shares during the period. Swedbank AB boosted its holdings in shares of Cisco Systems by 0.6% during the 3rd quarter. Swedbank AB now owns 9,029,594 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock worth $480,555,000 after buying an additional 52,711 shares in the last quarter. Sumitomo Life Insurance Co. grew its position in shares of Cisco Systems by 2.4% during the 3rd quarter. Sumitomo Life Insurance Co. now owns 36,707 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock worth $1,954,000 after buying an additional 847 shares during the period. Finally, IQ EQ FUND MANAGEMENT IRELAND Ltd increased its stake in shares of Cisco Systems by 0.8% in the 3rd quarter. IQ EQ FUND MANAGEMENT IRELAND Ltd now owns 188,268 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $10,020,000 after acquiring an additional 1,553 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 73.33% of the company’s stock.

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.