Arista Networks (NYSE:ANET) Shares Down 3.5% - Should You Sell?

Key Points

• Arista shares fell 3.5% to about $186.35, with trading volume 33% below its average. Despite the decline, the stock remains above its 50-day and 200-day moving averages.
• Analysts remain broadly bullish, with a consensus “Buy” rating and an average price target of $226.05; recent targets range from $225 to $250.
• The company exceeded quarterly expectations, reporting $1.02 in EPS versus $0.89 expected and $3.04 billion in revenue, up 37.7% year over year. However, insiders sold approximately $798.5 million of stock over the past 90 days, including a major sale by CEO Jayshree Ullal.

Shares of Arista Networks, Inc. (NYSE:ANET - Get Free Report) traded down 3.5% during trading on Wednesday . The stock traded as low as $184.51 and last traded at $186.3450. 5,718,816 shares traded hands during trading, a decline of 33% from the average daily volume of 8,589,193 shares. The stock had previously closed at $193.18.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of research analysts recently weighed in on the stock. Evercore restated an "outperform" rating on shares of Arista Networks in a research report on Wednesday, August 5th. Zacks Research raised Arista Networks from a "hold" rating to a "strong-buy" rating in a report on Monday, August 10th. The Goldman Sachs Group reissued a "buy" rating and issued a $225.00 target price on shares of Arista Networks in a report on Wednesday, August 5th. Piper Sandler reissued an "overweight" rating and set a $240.00 price target (up from $181.00) on shares of Arista Networks in a research note on Wednesday, August 5th. Finally, KeyCorp reissued an "overweight" rating and issued a $250.00 price objective (up from $200.00) on shares of Arista Networks in a research note on Wednesday, August 5th. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-two have assigned a Buy rating and one has assigned a Hold rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of "Buy" and an average target price of $226.05.

Arista Networks Stock Performance

The firm's 50 day simple moving average is $175.81 and its 200 day simple moving average is $155.48. The firm has a market capitalization of $235.02 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 58.78, a PEG ratio of 2.06 and a beta of 1.60.

Arista Networks (NYSE:ANET - Get Free Report) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, August 4th. The technology company reported $1.02 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.89 by $0.13. Arista Networks had a return on equity of 30.65% and a net margin of 38.37%.The firm had revenue of $3.04 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.83 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $0.73 EPS. Arista Networks's revenue for the quarter was up 37.7% compared to the same quarter last year. Arista Networks has set its Q3 2026 guidance at 1.060-1.080 EPS. As a group, sell-side analysts forecast that Arista Networks, Inc. will post 3.7 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling at Arista Networks

In other Arista Networks news, CEO Jayshree Ullal sold 573,509 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, August 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $208.13, for a total value of $119,364,428.17. Following the sale, the chief executive officer owned 25,000 shares of the company's stock, valued at $5,203,250. This trade represents a 95.82% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, insider Kenneth Duda sold 26,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, July 20th. The shares were sold at an average price of $170.51, for a total value of $4,433,260.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider directly owned 462,400 shares in the company, valued at $78,843,824. This trade represents a 5.32% decrease in their position. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Insiders sold a total of 4,334,197 shares of company stock worth $798,500,786 over the last ninety days. Company insiders own 2.70% of the company's stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in ANET. Norges Bank acquired a new position in shares of Arista Networks during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $1,558,563,000. Jupiter Topco LLC purchased a new stake in Arista Networks in the 2nd quarter worth about $1,101,860,000. M&T Bank Corp lifted its stake in Arista Networks by 3,182.7% in the 4th quarter. M&T Bank Corp now owns 4,012,373 shares of the technology company's stock worth $525,741,000 after acquiring an additional 3,890,146 shares in the last quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. boosted its position in Arista Networks by 59.3% during the 4th quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. now owns 7,878,360 shares of the technology company's stock worth $1,032,302,000 after acquiring an additional 2,934,098 shares during the period. Finally, Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA grew its stake in Arista Networks by 34.6% during the 2nd quarter. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA now owns 9,725,196 shares of the technology company's stock valued at $1,712,788,000 after acquiring an additional 2,497,275 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 82.47% of the company's stock.

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.

This instant news alert was generated by narrative science technology and financial data from MarketBeat in order to provide readers with the fastest reporting and unbiased coverage. Please send any questions or comments about this story to contact@marketbeat.com.

Continue following MarketBeat

Add MarketBeat as your preferred source on Google to see our latest stories in your feed.

Add As Preferred Source