Arista Networks (NYSE:ANET) Stock Price Up 2.5% – Here’s What Happened

Arista Networks, Inc. (NYSE:ANET) shot up 2.5% during mid-day trading on Wednesday . The company traded as high as $151.80 and last traded at $150.3070. 8,507,502 shares changed hands during trading, an increase of 3% from the average session volume of 8,267,482 shares. The stock had previously closed at $146.69.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of research analysts have weighed in on the company. Zacks Research lowered Arista Networks from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Monday, October 6th. Rosenblatt Securities reissued a “neutral” rating and issued a $140.00 price target on shares of Arista Networks in a research note on Monday, November 24th. Erste Group Bank downgraded shares of Arista Networks from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Monday, November 10th. UBS Group reissued a “buy” rating and issued a $155.00 target price on shares of Arista Networks in a research report on Wednesday, December 3rd. Finally, Barclays reaffirmed an “overweight” rating and set a $183.00 price target (up previously from $179.00) on shares of Arista Networks in a research note on Wednesday, November 5th. Seventeen research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and five have given a Hold rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Arista Networks currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $164.44.

Arista Networks Stock Performance

The company’s fifty day moving average is $130.99 and its two-hundred day moving average is $135.08. The firm has a market cap of $178.55 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 53.91, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.50 and a beta of 1.41.

Arista Networks (NYSE:ANET) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, November 4th. The technology company reported $0.75 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.72 by $0.03. Arista Networks had a return on equity of 30.28% and a net margin of 39.73%.The company had revenue of $2.31 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.26 billion. During the same period last year, the company posted $2.40 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue was up 27.5% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, analysts forecast that Arista Networks, Inc. will post 2.2 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Activity

In related news, insider Kenneth Duda sold 26,000 shares of Arista Networks stock in a transaction on Tuesday, January 20th. The shares were sold at an average price of $128.43, for a total transaction of $3,339,180.00. Following the sale, the insider owned 522,400 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $67,091,832. The trade was a 4.74% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, Director Charles H. Giancarlo sold 8,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Friday, January 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $133.79, for a total transaction of $1,070,320.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director owned 17,784 shares in the company, valued at $2,379,321.36. This represents a 31.03% decrease in their position. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. Insiders sold 216,464 shares of company stock worth $27,687,068 over the last three months. Insiders own 3.39% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of Arista Networks

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of ANET. Brighton Jones LLC grew its stake in Arista Networks by 321.7% during the 4th quarter. Brighton Jones LLC now owns 7,806 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $863,000 after purchasing an additional 5,955 shares in the last quarter. Revolve Wealth Partners LLC purchased a new position in shares of Arista Networks during the 4th quarter valued at approximately $202,000. Bison Wealth LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Arista Networks during the fourth quarter worth approximately $251,000. Sivia Capital Partners LLC increased its stake in shares of Arista Networks by 48.4% in the second 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 last quarter. Finally, Janney Montgomery Scott LLC raised its holdings in Arista Networks by 137.0% in the second quarter. Janney Montgomery Scott LLC now owns 310,166 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $31,733,000 after acquiring an additional 179,286 shares in the last quarter. 82.47% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

About Arista Networks

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.