Short Interest in Cogent Communications Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:CCOI) Rises By 15.5%

Cogent Communications Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:CCOI) saw a significant increase in short interest during the month of June. As of June 15th, there was short interest totalling 4,400,000 shares, an increase of 15.5% from the May 31st total of 3,810,000 shares. Based on an average trading volume of 485,600 shares, the days-to-cover ratio is presently 9.1 days. Currently, 10.0% of the company’s shares are sold short.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, CEO Dave Schaeffer sold 60,000 shares of Cogent Communications stock in a transaction on Friday, June 14th. The stock was sold at an average price of $51.78, for a total value of $3,106,800.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 4,433,038 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $229,542,707.64. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. In other news, Director Lewis H. Ferguson sold 2,000 shares of Cogent Communications stock in a transaction on Tuesday, May 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $58.90, for a total value of $117,800.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director now directly owns 17,623 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,037,994.70. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. Also, CEO Dave Schaeffer sold 60,000 shares of Cogent Communications stock in a transaction on Friday, June 14th. The shares were sold at an average price of $51.78, for a total value of $3,106,800.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 4,433,038 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $229,542,707.64. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 178,440 shares of company stock valued at $9,828,016 over the last quarter. 11.00% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Institutional Trading of Cogent Communications

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in CCOI. EdgePoint Investment Group Inc. increased its position in shares of Cogent Communications by 500.1% during the first quarter. EdgePoint Investment Group Inc. now owns 1,051,568 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $68,699,000 after purchasing an additional 876,326 shares in the last quarter. Capital World Investors increased its position in shares of Cogent Communications by 327.7% during the first quarter. Capital World Investors now owns 981,623 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $64,129,000 after purchasing an additional 752,133 shares in the last quarter. Norges Bank acquired a new stake in shares of Cogent Communications during the fourth quarter worth about $50,430,000. Westwood Holdings Group Inc. acquired a new position in Cogent Communications in the 4th quarter valued at about $48,184,000. Finally, M&G Plc acquired a new position in Cogent Communications in the 1st quarter valued at about $27,942,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 92.45% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

CCOI has been the subject of a number of recent research reports. TD Cowen decreased their target price on Cogent Communications from $84.00 to $78.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Friday, May 10th. KeyCorp decreased their target price on Cogent Communications from $88.00 to $80.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Friday, May 10th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. decreased their target price on Cogent Communications from $73.00 to $70.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a report on Monday, May 13th. StockNews.com lowered Cogent Communications from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a report on Thursday, April 25th. Finally, Bank of America lowered Cogent Communications from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and decreased their target price for the company from $85.00 to $75.00 in a report on Thursday, March 7th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have issued a hold rating and three have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $75.14.

Cogent Communications Stock Up 4.3 %

Shares of NASDAQ CCOI opened at $56.44 on Monday. The company has a market capitalization of $2.77 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 2.24 and a beta of 0.41. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 2.80, a current ratio of 1.12 and a quick ratio of 1.12. The business has a 50-day moving average of $58.37 and a two-hundred day moving average of $66.95. Cogent Communications has a 1 year low of $50.80 and a 1 year high of $86.00.

Cogent Communications (NASDAQ:CCOI) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, May 9th. The technology company reported ($1.29) EPS for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of ($1.10) by ($0.19). Cogent Communications had a negative return on equity of 24.63% and a net margin of 114.09%. The firm had revenue of $266.17 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $274.13 million. On average, analysts forecast that Cogent Communications will post -4.81 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Cogent Communications Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, June 7th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, May 23rd were given a dividend of $0.975 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Wednesday, May 22nd. This represents a $3.90 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 6.91%. This is a boost from Cogent Communications’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.97. Cogent Communications’s payout ratio is 15.45%.

About Cogent Communications

Cogent Communications Holdings, Inc, through its subsidiaries, provides high-speed Internet access, private network, and data center colocation space services in North America, Europe, Oceania, South America, and Africa. The company offers on-net Internet access and private network services to law firms, financial services firms, and advertising and marketing firms, as well as heath care providers, educational institutions and other professional services businesses, other Internet service providers, telephone companies, cable television companies, web hosting companies, media service providers, mobile phone operators, content delivery network companies, and commercial content and application service providers.