Kovack Advisors Inc. Boosts Stock Position in Arista Networks, Inc. $ANET

Kovack Advisors Inc. increased its stake in Arista Networks, Inc. (NYSE:ANET) by 48.8% during the third quarter, according to its most recent filing with the SEC. The fund owned 18,666 shares of the technology company’s stock after buying an additional 6,120 shares during the quarter. Kovack Advisors Inc.’s holdings in Arista Networks were worth $2,720,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also bought and sold shares of the company. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its stake in shares of Arista Networks by 1.0% during the 3rd quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 100,000,830 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $14,571,121,000 after acquiring an additional 1,007,730 shares during the period. Cresset Asset Management LLC grew its stake in Arista Networks by 1.0% in the 2nd quarter. Cresset Asset Management LLC now owns 26,374,373 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $2,698,362,000 after buying an additional 263,272 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC raised its holdings in Arista Networks by 0.5% during the 2nd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 25,576,483 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $2,606,694,000 after acquiring an additional 128,977 shares during the period. Norges Bank purchased a new stake in shares of Arista Networks during the second quarter worth $1,228,177,000. Finally, Schroder Investment Management Group lifted its position in shares of Arista Networks by 14.8% during the second quarter. Schroder Investment Management Group now owns 10,494,124 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $1,073,654,000 after acquiring an additional 1,350,593 shares in the last quarter. 82.47% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several equities analysts have recently weighed in on ANET shares. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their price target on Arista Networks from $175.00 to $185.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Friday, February 13th. Barclays reaffirmed an “overweight” rating and set a $184.00 target price (up previously from $183.00) on shares of Arista Networks in a report on Friday, February 13th. Morgan Stanley reissued an “overweight” rating and issued a $165.00 price target on shares of Arista Networks in a report on Friday, February 13th. Evercore restated an “outperform” rating and issued a $200.00 price objective on shares of Arista Networks in a research report on Friday, February 13th. Finally, Piper Sandler reaffirmed an “overweight” rating and set a $175.00 target price (up previously from $159.00) 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 stock. According to MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $175.44.

Insider Transactions at Arista Networks

In related news, insider Kenneth Duda sold 26,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, February 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $142.35, for a total value of $3,701,100.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider directly owned 512,400 shares in the company, valued at approximately $72,940,140. The trade was a 4.83% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, Director Charles H. Giancarlo sold 8,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on 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 transaction, the director directly owned 9,784 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,373,967.12. This represents a 44.98% decrease in their position. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. In the last ninety days, insiders sold 218,042 shares of company stock valued at $28,561,131. Insiders own 3.39% of the company’s stock.

Arista Networks Trading Down 1.8%

Shares of ANET opened at $136.97 on Friday. Arista Networks, Inc. has a 12-month low of $59.43 and a 12-month high of $164.94. The company has a market cap of $172.11 billion, a PE ratio of 49.63, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.35 and a beta of 1.42. The stock has a 50-day moving average price of $133.75 and a 200-day moving average price of $137.42.

Arista Networks (NYSE:ANET) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, February 12th. The technology company reported $0.82 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates 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 the consensus estimate of $2.38 billion. During the same period last year, the firm posted $0.66 earnings per share. Arista Networks’s quarterly revenue was up 28.9% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, analysts predict that Arista Networks, Inc. will post 2.2 earnings per share for the current year.

Arista Networks 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.