Arista Networks (NYSE:ANET) Stock Price Down 3.5% – Here’s What Happened

Arista Networks, Inc. (NYSE:ANET)’s share price was down 3.5% during trading on Thursday . The company traded as low as $132.01 and last traded at $135.7880. Approximately 14,878,760 shares were traded during mid-day trading, an increase of 74% from the average daily volume of 8,551,547 shares. The stock had previously closed at $140.66.

More Arista Networks News

Here are the key news stories impacting Arista Networks this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Q4 results beat — Arista reported EPS of $0.82 and revenue of $2.49B, both topping consensus, with healthy margins (net margin ~39.7%) — a clear fundamental positive. Arista Networks (ANET) Beats Q4 Earnings and Revenue Estimates
• Positive Sentiment: Management gave upbeat revenue guidance tied to accelerating AI-driven data center demand; Reuters notes Arista expects annual revenue above Street estimates and that comments drove a strong after‑hours rally. Arista Networks forecasts upbeat revenue as AI speeding lifts demand, shares jump
• Positive Sentiment: Analysts turned more constructive — Rosenblatt raised its price target and coverage commentary was bullish, supporting demand-side optimism. Rosenblatt Raises Price Target For Arista Networks (ANET)
• Positive Sentiment: Unusually large options activity: traders bought ~44,291 call options the day before earnings — a sign of speculative/hedged bullish positioning ahead of the print.
• Neutral Sentiment: Corporate release and commentary — the official BusinessWire press release details Q4 and full‑year results and highlights product/port milestones (helps validate long‑term story but doesn’t change near‑term math). Arista Networks, Inc. Reports Fourth Quarter and Year End 2025 Financial Results
• Negative Sentiment: Forward detail/clarity issues — one guidance entry in the news feed showed garbled EPS guidance text (and some investors may have perceived the guidance as incomplete or lacking clear EPS targets), which can introduce short‑term uncertainty.
• Negative Sentiment: Risks around AI exposure — coverage noting Arista’s growth tied to AI data centers also flagged evolving risks (competition, capex timing, concentration) that could make the stock more volatile as investors re‑weight risk. Arista Networks Ties Growth To AI Data Centers Amid New Risks

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of brokerages recently issued reports on ANET. 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. Piper Sandler upgraded shares of Arista Networks from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and lifted their price objective for the company from $145.00 to $159.00 in a report on Monday, January 5th. Rosenblatt Securities boosted their price objective on shares of Arista Networks from $140.00 to $165.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Tuesday. Weiss Ratings reaffirmed a “hold (c+)” rating on shares of Arista Networks in a research report on Monday, December 29th. Finally, Erste Group Bank lowered shares of Arista Networks from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Monday, November 10th. Seventeen equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and five have assigned a Hold rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $166.00.

Arista Networks Stock Down 3.5%

The business’s 50 day simple moving average is $132.65 and its 200 day simple moving average is $136.71. The stock has a market cap of $171.00 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 51.63, a PEG ratio of 2.42 and a beta of 1.42.

Arista Networks (NYSE:ANET) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, February 12th. The technology company reported $0.82 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.75 by $0.07. Arista Networks had a net margin of 39.73% and a return on equity of 30.28%. The company had revenue of $2.49 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $2.38 billion. Equities research analysts forecast that Arista Networks, Inc. will post 2.2 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, Director Charles H. Giancarlo sold 8,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, February 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $140.43, for a total value of $1,123,440.00. Following the sale, the director owned 9,784 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,373,967.12. This represents a 44.98% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, Director Kelly Bodnar Battles sold 422 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Friday, November 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $117.15, for a total value of $49,437.30. Following the sale, the director directly owned 8,980 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,052,007. This represents a 4.49% decrease in their position. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. In the last three months, insiders sold 216,464 shares of company stock valued at $27,553,548. Corporate insiders own 3.39% of the company’s stock.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Arista Networks

Large investors have recently modified their holdings of the stock. Global Trust Asset Management LLC boosted its stake in shares of Arista Networks by 33.0% in the 3rd quarter. Global Trust Asset Management LLC now owns 19,273 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $2,808,000 after purchasing an additional 4,780 shares during the last quarter. Rakuten Investment Management Inc. acquired a new position in Arista Networks in the third quarter valued at $8,263,000. National Wealth Management Group LLC bought a new stake in Arista Networks during the third quarter valued at $1,296,000. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its holdings in Arista Networks by 1.2% during the 2nd quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 98,993,100 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $10,127,984,000 after acquiring an additional 1,136,167 shares during the period. Finally, Holocene Advisors LP bought a new position in shares of Arista Networks in the 2nd quarter worth about $247,451,000. 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.