Bridgewater Advisors Inc. Trims Stake in Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO)

Bridgewater Advisors Inc. cut its position in shares of Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO) by 11.0% in the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The firm owned 42,395 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock after selling 5,261 shares during the quarter. Bridgewater Advisors Inc.’s holdings in Cisco Systems were worth $2,515,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. BRITISH COLUMBIA INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT Corp grew its holdings in shares of Cisco Systems by 59.3% in the second quarter. BRITISH COLUMBIA INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT Corp now owns 775,559 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock worth $36,847,000 after purchasing an additional 288,775 shares during the last quarter. Morse Asset Management Inc purchased a new stake in Cisco Systems in the 3rd quarter valued at about $798,000. HighVista Strategies LLC bought a new position in Cisco Systems in the 3rd quarter worth about $1,698,000. GAMMA Investing LLC increased its position in shares of Cisco Systems by 13.1% during the fourth quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 93,357 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock worth $5,527,000 after acquiring an additional 10,813 shares during the period. Finally, Commerzbank Aktiengesellschaft FI raised its stake in shares of Cisco Systems by 10.9% during the third quarter. Commerzbank Aktiengesellschaft FI now owns 1,658,417 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $88,261,000 after acquiring an additional 162,544 shares in the last quarter. 73.33% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Insider Transactions at Cisco Systems

In other news, SVP Maria Victoria Wong sold 586 shares of Cisco Systems stock in a transaction dated Thursday, December 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $58.69, for a total value of $34,392.34. Following the sale, the senior vice president now owns 50,767 shares in the company, valued at $2,979,515.23. This trade represents a 1.14 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. 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 value of $180,055.98. Following the completion of the sale, the executive vice president now directly owns 207,798 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $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 353,522 shares of company stock valued at $20,349,721 in the last 90 days. 0.01% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of brokerages have weighed in on CSCO. Melius raised Cisco Systems from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and lifted their target price for the company from $66.00 to $73.00 in a research report on Monday, January 6th. Tigress Financial upped their price objective on shares of Cisco Systems from $76.00 to $78.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Monday, October 14th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised shares of Cisco Systems from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and raised their target price for the company from $55.00 to $66.00 in a research report on Monday, November 11th. Morgan Stanley upped their price target on shares of Cisco Systems from $62.00 to $68.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Tuesday, December 17th. Finally, Bank of America lifted their price objective on shares of Cisco Systems from $60.00 to $72.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, November 14th. Eight equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twelve have issued a buy rating and two have given a strong buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $61.50.

Cisco Systems Stock Performance

Shares of NASDAQ CSCO opened at $60.23 on Monday. The company has a 50 day simple moving average of $58.91 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $53.57. The stock has a market cap of $239.88 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 25.85, a PEG ratio of 4.37 and a beta of 0.84. The company has a current ratio of 0.88, a quick ratio of 0.80 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.43. Cisco Systems, Inc. has a 12 month low of $44.50 and a 12 month high of $60.95.

Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, November 13th. The network equipment provider reported $0.91 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.87 by $0.04. The company had revenue of $13.84 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $13.78 billion. Cisco Systems had a net margin of 17.73% and a return on equity of 25.70%. The firm’s revenue was down 5.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the company earned $0.98 earnings per share. As a group, analysts predict that Cisco Systems, Inc. will post 2.97 earnings per share for the current year.

Cisco Systems Dividend Announcement

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, January 22nd. Shareholders of record on Friday, January 3rd will be issued a $0.40 dividend. This represents a $1.60 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 2.66%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, January 3rd. Cisco Systems’s payout ratio is presently 68.67%.

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.