Arista Networks (NYSE:ANET) Trading 3.6% Higher – What’s Next?

Arista Networks, Inc. (NYSE:ANET)’s share price shot up 3.6% during mid-day trading on Monday . The company traded as high as $138.21 and last traded at $135.9820. 6,398,586 shares changed hands during mid-day trading, a decline of 21% from the average session volume of 8,140,924 shares. The stock had previously closed at $131.22.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of brokerages have commented on ANET. Weiss Ratings reissued a “hold (c+)” rating on shares of Arista Networks in a report on Monday, December 29th. Evercore reiterated an “outperform” rating and set a $200.00 target price on shares of Arista Networks in a research report on Friday, February 13th. KeyCorp reissued an “overweight” rating and set a $178.00 price target (up from $170.00) on shares of Arista Networks in a research note on Friday, February 13th. Wells Fargo & Company raised their price target on shares of Arista Networks from $175.00 to $185.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Friday, February 13th. Finally, Barclays reaffirmed an “overweight” rating and set a $184.00 price objective (up from $183.00) on shares of Arista Networks in a report on Friday, February 13th. Eighteen analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and five have issued a Hold rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $176.47.

Arista Networks Stock Performance

The company has a market cap of $170.87 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 49.27, a PEG ratio of 2.32 and a beta of 1.46. The firm’s 50-day moving average price is $135.36 and its 200 day moving average price is $137.27.

Arista Networks (NYSE:ANET) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, February 12th. The technology company reported $0.82 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.75 by $0.07. Arista Networks had a net margin of 38.99% and a return on equity of 30.37%. The business had revenue of $2.49 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.38 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the business posted $0.66 earnings per share. Arista Networks’s revenue was up 28.9% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities research analysts predict that Arista Networks, Inc. will post 2.2 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Transactions at Arista Networks

In related news, insider Kenneth Duda sold 32,000 shares of Arista Networks stock in a transaction on Tuesday, March 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $134.14, for a total transaction of $4,292,480.00. Following the completion of the sale, the insider directly owned 12,976 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,740,600.64. The trade was a 71.15% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. Also, Director Charles H. Giancarlo sold 8,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, February 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $140.43, for a total value of $1,123,440.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director owned 9,784 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,373,967.12. This represents a 44.98% decrease in their position. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. Insiders have sold 199,632 shares of company stock worth $26,936,324 in the last three months. Insiders own 3.39% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of Arista Networks

Institutional investors and hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of the stock. Brighton Jones LLC boosted its position in shares of Arista Networks by 321.7% during the fourth quarter. Brighton Jones LLC now owns 7,806 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $863,000 after purchasing an additional 5,955 shares in the last quarter. Revolve Wealth Partners LLC bought a new stake in shares of Arista Networks in the 4th quarter valued at $202,000. Bison Wealth LLC bought a new stake in shares of Arista Networks in the 4th quarter valued at $251,000. Sivia Capital Partners LLC raised its stake in Arista Networks by 48.4% during the 2nd quarter. Sivia Capital Partners LLC now owns 10,723 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $1,097,000 after buying an additional 3,496 shares during the period. Finally, AlphaCore Capital LLC acquired a new stake in Arista Networks during the 2nd quarter worth $78,000. 82.47% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Arista Networks Company Profile

Arista Networks, Inc is a technology company that designs and sells cloud networking solutions for large-scale data centers and enterprise environments. The company is best known for its high-performance switching and routing platforms, which are used to build scalable, low-latency networks for cloud service providers, internet companies, financial services, telecommunications, and enterprise IT. Arista’s offerings emphasize programmability, automation and telemetry to support modern, software-driven network architectures.

Central to Arista’s product portfolio is its Extensible Operating System (EOS), a modular network operating system that provides consistent programmability, stateful control and advanced visibility across the company’s hardware platforms.