Arista Networks (NYSE:ANET) Shares Up 3.2% – Should You Buy?

Shares of Arista Networks, Inc. (NYSE:ANET) rose 3.2% during trading on Wednesday . The company traded as high as $133.78 and last traded at $132.9030. Approximately 7,171,352 shares changed hands during trading, a decline of 19% from the average daily volume of 8,862,741 shares. The stock had previously closed at $128.77.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several equities research analysts have commented on the company. Piper Sandler reiterated an “overweight” rating and set a $175.00 price objective (up from $159.00) on shares of Arista Networks in a research note on Friday, February 13th. Erste Group Bank cut Arista Networks from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Monday, November 10th. UBS Group set a $200.00 price objective on Arista Networks in a research note on Tuesday. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their target price on shares of Arista Networks from $175.00 to $185.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Friday, February 13th. Finally, KeyCorp reaffirmed an “overweight” rating and set a $178.00 target price (up from $170.00) on shares of Arista Networks in a report on Friday, February 13th. Seventeen analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and five have assigned a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Arista Networks has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $176.88.

Arista Networks Price Performance

The stock has a market cap of $167.00 billion, a PE ratio of 48.15, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.26 and a beta of 1.42. The stock’s fifty day moving average is $133.98 and its 200-day moving average is $137.47.

Arista Networks (NYSE:ANET) last posted its earnings results 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 company had revenue of $2.49 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.38 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $0.66 EPS. Arista Networks’s revenue was up 28.9% on a year-over-year basis. On average, sell-side analysts expect that Arista Networks, Inc. will post 2.2 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Activity at Arista Networks

In other news, Director Charles H. Giancarlo sold 8,000 shares of the company’s 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 transaction, 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 sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, insider Kenneth Duda sold 32,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Tuesday, February 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $142.44, for a total value of $4,558,080.00. Following the transaction, the insider owned 12,976 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,848,301.44. This represents a 71.15% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. Insiders sold 194,000 shares of company stock valued at $25,566,700 over the last quarter. 3.54% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Bare Financial Services Inc boosted its position in shares of Arista Networks by 2,118.2% during the 2nd quarter. Bare Financial Services Inc now owns 244 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $25,000 after purchasing an additional 233 shares during the period. Board of the Pension Protection Fund purchased a new position in shares of Arista Networks during the fourth quarter worth $26,000. Prosperity Bancshares Inc acquired a new stake in shares of Arista Networks in the fourth quarter valued at $28,000. AdvisorNet Financial Inc raised its holdings in shares of Arista Networks by 56.7% in the 3rd quarter. AdvisorNet Financial Inc now owns 199 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $29,000 after buying an additional 72 shares during the period. Finally, Knuff & Co LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Arista Networks in the 3rd quarter valued at $29,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 82.47% of the company’s stock.

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.