First Merchants Corp Purchases 4,204 Shares of Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO)

First Merchants Corp boosted its position in shares of Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO) by 5.1% during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund owned 87,424 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 4,204 shares during the period. First Merchants Corp’s holdings in Cisco Systems were worth $5,176,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently added to or reduced their stakes in CSCO. Pflug Koory LLC grew its stake in shares of Cisco Systems by 0.5% during the fourth quarter. Pflug Koory LLC now owns 33,026 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $1,955,000 after buying an additional 165 shares during the last quarter. Beaumont Financial Advisors LLC boosted its holdings in Cisco Systems by 1.7% during the 4th quarter. Beaumont Financial Advisors LLC now owns 10,591 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $627,000 after acquiring an additional 173 shares during the period. SeaCrest Wealth Management LLC grew its position in Cisco Systems by 0.6% in the 4th quarter. SeaCrest Wealth Management LLC now owns 31,744 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $1,879,000 after acquiring an additional 178 shares during the last quarter. Aviso Wealth Management grew its position in Cisco Systems by 2.4% in the 3rd quarter. Aviso Wealth Management now owns 7,615 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $405,000 after acquiring an additional 181 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Waypoint Capital Advisors LLC increased its stake in Cisco Systems by 2.9% in the third quarter. Waypoint Capital Advisors LLC now owns 6,497 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock worth $346,000 after purchasing an additional 182 shares during the period. 73.33% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

CSCO has been the topic of a number of research analyst reports. Rosenblatt Securities upgraded shares of Cisco Systems from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and upped their price target for the stock from $66.00 to $80.00 in a report on Thursday. Piper Sandler upped their target price on shares of Cisco Systems from $57.00 to $72.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday. StockNews.com raised shares of Cisco Systems from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, November 14th. The Goldman Sachs Group boosted their price target on Cisco Systems from $56.00 to $63.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday. Finally, Bank of America raised their price objective on Cisco Systems from $60.00 to $72.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, November 14th. Seven analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fourteen have assigned a buy rating and two have issued a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $66.53.

Cisco Systems Price Performance

CSCO opened at $63.84 on Friday. The firm has a market capitalization of $254.26 billion, a PE ratio of 27.40, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 4.63 and a beta of 0.84. The business’s 50-day moving average is $59.89 and its two-hundred day moving average is $55.36. Cisco Systems, Inc. has a 1 year low of $44.50 and a 1 year high of $66.50. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.43, a current ratio of 0.88 and a quick ratio of 0.80.

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

Cisco Systems Increases Dividend

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

Cisco Systems declared that its board has initiated a stock repurchase plan on Wednesday, February 12th that permits the company to repurchase $15.00 billion in outstanding shares. This repurchase authorization permits the network equipment provider to purchase up to 6% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase plans are often an indication that the company’s board of directors believes its shares are undervalued.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Cisco Systems news, EVP Thimaya K. Subaiya sold 21,230 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, November 20th. The stock was sold at an average price of $57.07, for a total value of $1,211,596.10. Following the completion of the sale, the executive vice president now owns 213,834 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $12,203,506.38. This trade represents a 9.03 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, Director Kristina M. Johnson sold 7,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, December 6th. The shares were sold at an average price of $59.87, for a total transaction of $449,025.00. Following the transaction, the director now owns 65,915 shares in the company, valued at approximately $3,946,331.05. This trade represents a 10.22 % 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 worth $2,166,612 in the last ninety days. 0.01% of the stock is owned by insiders.

About Cisco Systems

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.