If you happen to purchased Cisco Techniques on March 27, 2000, you are lastly entire. After almost 26 years within the wilderness, shares of Cisco have climbed above their dotcom bubble intraday peak, closing an extended chapter for what was as soon as the period’s final poster youngster for web extra. The inventory eclipsed the report shut it reached final yr. The restoration has been an extended one. After peaking in March 2000, Cisco’s shares tanked almost 90% because the dot-com bubble burst, finally closing at a split-adjusted $8.60 on Oct. 8, 2002. In the present day’s Cisco seems to be little just like the hardware-centric development engine that briefly turned the world’s Most worthy firm on the peak of the web mania. Cisco is now a cash-generative firm, more and more oriented towards software program and providers and tying itself carefully to the artificially intelligence increase. Whereas networking {hardware} stays its basis, the corporate now sells a rising suite of software program and providers spanning cybersecurity, observability and cloud administration. That shift was bolstered by its roughly $28 billion acquisition of Splunk, which Cisco has positioned as a cornerstone of its push into information monitoring and safety analytics. Cisco has additionally been working to embed itself deeper into AI data-center architectures. It lately launched a brand new Ethernet swap constructed on silicon from Nvidia , a transfer geared toward making its networking gear extra integral to large-scale AI methods. In November, Cisco mentioned AI-infrastructure orders from hyperscaler prospects reached $1.3 billion, ” reflecting a major acceleration in development.” Costly? Nonetheless, some buyers are cautious of how a lot optimism is already priced into the inventory. “I give the corporate credit score for reasserting itself within the AI period, however I feel the inventory is dear,” mentioned Paul Meeks, a veteran expertise investor and head of tech analysis at Freedom Capital Markets. At roughly 20 instances this yr’s earnings and 18 instances subsequent yr’s, Meeks mentioned the inventory already costs in additional development than Cisco is predicted to ship, with earnings projected to rise about simply 8% yearly, under the S & P 500’s anticipated tempo. Buyers stepping in now are successfully betting on Cisco crushing Wall Avenue estimates in its subsequent two quarterly studies, beginning Feb. 11, he mentioned. To make sure, Cisco’s a number of stays a fraction of the roughly 126 instances ahead earnings buyers have been prepared to pay when Cisco final hit an all-time excessive within the first quarter of 2000, in keeping with information compiled by FactSet. ‘Defensive tech’ Analysts at UBS lately named Cisco an “out-of-consensus prime choose,” arguing the market nonetheless treats the corporate as an “AI loser” with solely mid-single-digit income development. UBS’s supply-chain checks level to greater than $4 billion in AI-related orders in fiscal 2026, up from about $2 billion in fiscal 2025. That demand might result in earnings beats and upward revisions to Cisco’s fiscal-2026 steerage, with income development approaching the excessive single digits and double-digit EPS development, UBS mentioned. Evercore ISI upgraded Cisco to outperform final week and lifted its value goal to $100 from $80, saying a resurgence in core networking alongside accelerating AI demand ought to enable the corporate to maintain high-single-digit income development and low-teens EPS development over a number of years. The $100 value goal represents a 22% upside from the present stage round $82. The Wall Avenue agency referred to as Cisco a sexy “defensive tech,” with the potential for EPS to exceed $5 and the valuation emigrate towards a 20x a number of. — With help from CNBC’s Nick Wells.