Mufg Securities Americas Inc. Buys Shares of 4,888 Juniper Networks, Inc. (NYSE:JNPR)

Mufg Securities Americas Inc. bought a new stake in Juniper Networks, Inc. (NYSE:JNPR) during the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The institutional investor bought 4,888 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock, valued at approximately $183,000.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in JNPR. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. lifted its stake in shares of Juniper Networks by 10.8% during the 4th quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 83,254 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $3,118,000 after buying an additional 8,118 shares in the last quarter. Ritholtz Wealth Management purchased a new stake in shares of Juniper Networks during the 4th quarter valued at approximately $207,000. Avanza Fonder AB purchased a new stake in shares of Juniper Networks during the 4th quarter valued at approximately $1,349,000. SG Americas Securities LLC lifted its stake in shares of Juniper Networks by 123.8% during the 4th quarter. SG Americas Securities LLC now owns 226,448 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $8,480,000 after buying an additional 125,278 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Empirical Financial Services LLC d.b.a. Empirical Wealth Management purchased a new stake in shares of Juniper Networks during the 4th quarter valued at approximately $1,374,000. 91.95% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Insider Transactions at Juniper Networks

In other news, COO Manoj Leelanivas sold 30,978 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, February 26th. The shares were sold at an average price of $36.02, for a total value of $1,115,827.56. Following the completion of the sale, the chief operating officer now owns 94,771 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,413,651.42. This represents a 24.63% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this link. Insiders own 1.37% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of analysts recently weighed in on JNPR shares. StockNews.com raised shares of Juniper Networks from a “buy” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Friday, May 2nd. Evercore ISI raised shares of Juniper Networks from an “in-line” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $40.00 target price on the stock in a report on Tuesday, February 4th. Argus lowered shares of Juniper Networks from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Friday, February 7th. Barclays upped their target price on shares of Juniper Networks from $39.00 to $40.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Monday, May 5th. Finally, Rosenblatt Securities reaffirmed a “neutral” rating and set a $40.00 target price on shares of Juniper Networks in a report on Friday, May 2nd. Five investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, one has given a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $40.00.

Juniper Networks Price Performance

Shares of NYSE:JNPR opened at $36.08 on Friday. The company’s fifty day moving average price is $35.60 and its 200-day moving average price is $36.53. The firm has a market capitalization of $12.06 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 41.95, a PEG ratio of 2.20 and a beta of 0.82. Juniper Networks, Inc. has a one year low of $33.42 and a one year high of $39.79. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.25, a current ratio of 1.46 and a quick ratio of 1.14.

Juniper Networks (NYSE:JNPR) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, May 1st. The network equipment provider reported $0.43 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.41 by $0.02. The firm had revenue of $1.28 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.28 billion. Juniper Networks had a net margin of 5.67% and a return on equity of 7.57%. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 11.4% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm earned $0.29 EPS. On average, equities research analysts anticipate that Juniper Networks, Inc. will post 1.33 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Juniper Networks Dividend Announcement

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, June 23rd. Stockholders of record on Monday, June 2nd will be issued a $0.22 dividend. This represents a $0.88 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.44%. The ex-dividend date is Monday, June 2nd. Juniper Networks’s payout ratio is 83.81%.

Juniper Networks Company Profile

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.