Needham & Company LLC Reiterates Hold Rating for Juniper Networks (NYSE:JNPR)

Needham & Company LLC reiterated their hold rating on shares of Juniper Networks (NYSE:JNPR) in a research note published on Friday, Benzinga reports.

Other analysts have also recently issued reports about the stock. StockNews.com initiated coverage on shares of Juniper Networks in a research note on Thursday, April 25th. They issued a hold rating on the stock. Jefferies Financial Group restated a hold rating and set a $40.00 target price (up from $35.00) on shares of Juniper Networks in a research report on Thursday, January 11th. Barclays restated an equal weight rating on shares of Juniper Networks in a research note on Wednesday, January 10th. KeyCorp reiterated a sector weight rating on shares of Juniper Networks in a research report on Thursday, January 11th. Finally, Morgan Stanley upgraded shares of Juniper Networks from an underweight rating to an equal weight rating and set a $40.00 price objective on the stock in a research report on Thursday, January 11th. Eleven investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and two have assigned a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of Hold and a consensus target price of $34.55.

Juniper Networks Stock Up 1.3 %

Shares of NYSE JNPR opened at $35.15 on Friday. The company has a quick ratio of 1.27, a current ratio of 1.74 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.36. The company has a market cap of $11.42 billion, a P/E ratio of 50.94, a P/E/G ratio of 7.24 and a beta of 0.98. Juniper Networks has a 52 week low of $24.87 and a 52 week high of $38.04. The business has a 50-day simple moving average of $36.75 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $32.94.

Juniper Networks (NYSE:JNPR) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, January 30th. The network equipment provider reported $0.43 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.44 by ($0.01). The firm had revenue of $1.36 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.41 billion. Juniper Networks had a return on equity of 10.02% and a net margin of 4.19%. Research analysts anticipate that Juniper Networks will post 1.35 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Juniper Networks Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, June 24th. Investors of record on Monday, June 3rd will be issued a dividend of $0.22 per share. This represents a $0.88 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.50%. The ex-dividend date is Monday, June 3rd. Juniper Networks’s dividend payout ratio is currently 127.54%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Juniper Networks news, SVP Robert Mobassaly sold 5,173 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, February 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $36.78, for a total transaction of $190,262.94. Following the completion of the sale, the senior vice president now directly owns 36,061 shares in the company, valued at $1,326,323.58. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through this link. In other Juniper Networks news, SVP Robert Mobassaly sold 5,173 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, February 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $36.78, for a total value of $190,262.94. Following the completion of the sale, the senior vice president now owns 36,061 shares in the company, valued at $1,326,323.58. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, CEO Rami Rahim sold 5,556 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, February 7th. The shares were sold at an average price of $37.10, for a total value of $206,127.60. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 829,406 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $30,770,962.60. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 216,302 shares of company stock valued at $8,005,602 over the last three months. Insiders own 1.29% of the company’s stock.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Juniper Networks

A number of hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of JNPR. Principal Financial Group Inc. increased its holdings in Juniper Networks by 3.1% during the 1st quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 437,732 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $16,222,000 after purchasing an additional 13,203 shares during the period. Mn Services Vermogensbeheer B.V. purchased a new position in shares of Juniper Networks during the first quarter valued at approximately $4,799,000. Checchi Capital Advisers LLC bought a new position in shares of Juniper Networks during the first quarter valued at approximately $234,000. New York State Teachers Retirement System lifted its stake in Juniper Networks by 0.5% in the first quarter. New York State Teachers Retirement System now owns 300,096 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock worth $11,122,000 after acquiring an additional 1,573 shares during the period. Finally, Regis Management CO LLC bought a new stake in Juniper Networks in the first quarter valued at $245,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 91.95% of the company’s stock.

About Juniper Networks

Juniper Networks, Inc designs, develops, and sells network products and services worldwide. The company offers routing products, such as ACX series universal access routers to deploy high-bandwidth services; MX series Ethernet routers that function as a universal edge platform; PTX series packet transport routers; wide-area network SDN controllers; and session smart routers.