Arista Networks (NYSE:ANET) Shares Down 4.9% – Time to Sell?

Arista Networks, Inc. (NYSE:ANET)’s stock price was down 4.9% on Thursday . The stock traded as low as $122.81 and last traded at $123.77. Approximately 8,918,964 shares were traded during mid-day trading, an increase of 15% from the average daily volume of 7,773,386 shares. The stock had previously closed at $130.08.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

ANET has been the subject of a number of recent analyst reports. Evercore ISI upped their price target on Arista Networks from $150.00 to $175.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Friday, September 12th. Piper Sandler raised shares of Arista Networks from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and upped their target price for the company from $145.00 to $159.00 in a research note on Monday. Morgan Stanley reduced their price target on shares of Arista Networks from $171.00 to $159.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, December 17th. UBS Group restated a “buy” rating and issued a $155.00 price objective on shares of Arista Networks in a research report on Wednesday, December 3rd. Finally, Erste Group Bank lowered Arista Networks from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Monday, November 10th. Eighteen analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and five have issued a Hold rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $164.44.

Arista Networks Stock Down 4.9%

The firm has a market capitalization of $155.86 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 47.06, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.23 and a beta of 1.41. The business’s fifty day moving average is $131.81 and its 200 day moving average is $131.49.

Arista Networks (NYSE:ANET) last released its earnings results on Tuesday, November 4th. The technology company reported $0.75 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.72 by $0.03. The firm had revenue of $2.31 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $2.26 billion. Arista Networks had a return on equity of 30.28% and a net margin of 39.73%.The company’s revenue was up 27.5% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company earned $2.40 EPS. Equities research analysts expect that Arista Networks, Inc. will post 2.2 EPS for the current year.

Insider Transactions at Arista Networks

In other Arista Networks news, Director Kelly Bodnar Battles sold 422 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, November 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $117.15, for a total transaction of $49,437.30. Following the completion of the transaction, the director owned 8,980 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,052,007. This represents a 4.49% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Also, CEO Jayshree Ullal sold 24,042 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, November 25th. The stock was sold at an average price of $124.55, for a total transaction of $2,994,431.10. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer directly owned 9,917 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,235,162.35. This represents a 70.80% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. Over the last quarter, insiders have sold 216,464 shares of company stock worth $28,488,988. 3.39% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Arista Networks

Several institutional investors and hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the business. SteelPeak Wealth LLC increased its holdings in Arista Networks by 23.8% during the second quarter. SteelPeak Wealth LLC now owns 40,404 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $4,134,000 after buying an additional 7,779 shares during the last quarter. Penobscot Investment Management Company Inc. increased its stake in shares of Arista Networks by 7.8% during the 2nd quarter. Penobscot Investment Management Company Inc. now owns 39,073 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $3,998,000 after purchasing an additional 2,815 shares during the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its holdings in shares of Arista Networks by 1.2% in the 2nd quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 98,993,100 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $10,127,984,000 after purchasing an additional 1,136,167 shares during the period. Holocene Advisors LP purchased a new position in Arista Networks in the second quarter valued at approximately $247,451,000. Finally, Soltis Investment Advisors LLC lifted its stake in Arista Networks by 99.3% in the second quarter. Soltis Investment Advisors LLC now owns 40,428 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $4,136,000 after purchasing an additional 20,141 shares during the last quarter. 82.47% of the stock is owned by 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.