Fjarde AP Fonden Fourth Swedish National Pension Fund Sells 18,800 Shares of Juniper Networks, Inc. (NYSE:JNPR)

Fjarde AP Fonden Fourth Swedish National Pension Fund lowered its stake in Juniper Networks, Inc. (NYSE:JNPR) by 10.4% during the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The firm owned 162,271 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock after selling 18,800 shares during the period. Fjarde AP Fonden Fourth Swedish National Pension Fund’s holdings in Juniper Networks were worth $6,077,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also made changes to their positions in the company. Allianz Asset Management GmbH lifted its stake in Juniper Networks by 2.5% in the fourth quarter. Allianz Asset Management GmbH now owns 1,319,851 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $49,428,000 after buying an additional 31,667 shares during the period. ING Groep NV raised its position in shares of Juniper Networks by 32.0% in the 4th quarter. ING Groep NV now owns 1,559,587 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $58,407,000 after acquiring an additional 378,265 shares during the period. Handelsbanken Fonder AB boosted its stake in Juniper Networks by 47.6% during the 4th quarter. Handelsbanken Fonder AB now owns 116,200 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock worth $4,352,000 after acquiring an additional 37,500 shares during the last quarter. Kentucky Retirement Systems Insurance Trust Fund grew its holdings in Juniper Networks by 83.5% during the fourth quarter. Kentucky Retirement Systems Insurance Trust Fund now owns 17,884 shares of the network equipment provider’s stock valued at $670,000 after purchasing an additional 8,138 shares during the period. Finally, Kestra Investment Management LLC acquired a new position in Juniper Networks during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $204,000. 91.95% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

JNPR has been the topic of a number of recent analyst reports. Argus cut shares of Juniper Networks from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Friday, February 7th. Evercore ISI upgraded 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. Barclays boosted their target price on Juniper Networks from $37.00 to $39.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, February 5th. Rosenblatt Securities reaffirmed a “neutral” rating and set a $40.00 price target on shares of Juniper Networks in a research report on Friday, November 1st. Finally, StockNews.com upgraded Juniper Networks from a “buy” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, February 18th. Five equities research 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 stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $39.80.

Juniper Networks Stock Performance

JNPR opened at $35.96 on Tuesday. The company has a market capitalization of $11.90 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 41.81, a P/E/G ratio of 2.20 and a beta of 0.87. The business’s 50-day moving average price is $37.17 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $37.87. Juniper Networks, Inc. has a 1 year low of $33.72 and a 1 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 announced its earnings results on Tuesday, February 4th. The network equipment provider reported $0.45 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.58 by ($0.13). Juniper Networks had a net margin of 5.67% and a return on equity of 7.57%. Equities analysts expect that Juniper Networks, Inc. will post 1.33 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Juniper Networks Announces Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, March 24th. Stockholders of record on Monday, March 3rd will be given a $0.22 dividend. This represents a $0.88 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.45%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, March 3rd. Juniper Networks’s dividend payout ratio is presently 102.33%.

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.