Associated Banc Corp Raises Stock Holdings in Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO)

Associated Banc Corp grew its stake in Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO) by 3.0% in the third quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The institutional investor owned 312,578 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock after buying an additional 9,012 shares during the period. Associated Banc Corp’s holdings in Cisco Systems were worth $16,635,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also bought and sold shares of the stock. Summit Securities Group LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Cisco Systems during the second quarter worth about $25,000. Quarry LP grew its position in shares of Cisco Systems by 222.4% during the second quarter. Quarry LP now owns 661 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock worth $31,000 after purchasing an additional 456 shares in the last quarter. West Financial Advisors LLC grew its position in shares of Cisco Systems by 116.6% during the third quarter. West Financial Advisors LLC now owns 574 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock worth $31,000 after purchasing an additional 309 shares in the last quarter. Hobbs Group Advisors LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Cisco Systems during the second quarter worth about $36,000. Finally, Iron Horse Wealth Management LLC grew its position in shares of Cisco Systems by 617.7% during the second quarter. Iron Horse Wealth Management LLC now owns 890 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock worth $42,000 after purchasing an additional 766 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 73.33% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities analysts recently commented on the company. New Street Research raised Cisco Systems from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $57.00 price target for the company in a research note on Thursday, August 15th. Hsbc Global Res raised Cisco Systems to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Friday, August 16th. Evercore ISI increased 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. Citigroup increased their price target on Cisco Systems from $62.00 to $64.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, November 14th. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company increased their price target on Cisco Systems from $57.00 to $60.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Thursday, November 14th. Ten research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, eleven have assigned a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Cisco Systems presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $59.94.

Cisco Systems Stock Up 0.2 %

Shares of NASDAQ:CSCO traded up $0.10 on Monday, reaching $58.65. The company had a trading volume of 1,697,327 shares, compared to its average volume of 19,031,783. Cisco Systems, Inc. has a 52-week low of $44.50 and a 52-week high of $59.38. The firm’s 50 day simple moving average is $55.02 and its 200-day simple moving average is $50.17. The firm has a market capitalization of $233.59 billion, a PE ratio of 25.13, a PEG ratio of 4.37 and a beta of 0.83. 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 (NASDAQ:CSCO) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, November 13th. The network equipment provider reported $0.91 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.87 by $0.04. Cisco Systems had a return on equity of 25.70% and a net margin of 17.73%. The business had revenue of $13.84 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $13.78 billion. During the same period last year, the business posted $0.98 EPS. The business’s revenue was down 5.6% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, analysts expect that Cisco Systems, Inc. will post 2.97 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Cisco Systems Announces Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, January 22nd. Stockholders of record on Friday, January 3rd will be issued a $0.40 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, January 3rd. This represents a $1.60 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.73%. Cisco Systems’s dividend payout ratio is presently 68.67%.

Insider Activity

In other Cisco Systems news, EVP Thimaya K. Subaiya sold 1,328 shares of Cisco Systems stock in a transaction dated Thursday, September 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $48.92, for a total transaction of $64,965.76. Following the completion of the sale, the executive vice president now owns 132,910 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $6,501,957.20. The trade was a 0.99 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. Also, SVP Maria Victoria Wong sold 3,379 shares of Cisco Systems stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, August 28th. The stock was sold at an average price of $50.36, for a total value of $170,166.44. Following the sale, the senior vice president now directly owns 47,182 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,376,085.52. This represents a 6.68 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last three months, insiders have sold 342,858 shares of company stock worth $19,661,157. 0.01% of the stock is currently owned by company 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.