Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA Decreases Position in Arista Networks, Inc. $ANET

Key Points

• Massachusetts Financial Services Co. trimmed its stake in Arista Networks by 5.8% in Q4, selling 331,801 shares and retaining 5,389,355 shares worth about $706.17 million (roughly 0.43% of the company).
• Arista beat Q4 expectations with $0.82 EPS and $2.49 billion in revenue (up 28.9% YoY), and analysts have raised targets, leaving a consensus Moderate Buy rating with an average price target of $176.44.
• Company insiders sold a total of 199,632 shares (~$26.9 million) in the past three months — including significant sales by Kenneth Duda and Charles Giancarlo — with insiders now owning 3.39% of the stock.

Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA lessened its holdings in Arista Networks, Inc. (NYSE:ANET - Free Report) by 5.8% in the 4th quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 5,389,355 shares of the technology company's stock after selling 331,801 shares during the period. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA owned approximately 0.43% of Arista Networks worth $706,167,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently added to or reduced their stakes in ANET. Board of the Pension Protection Fund purchased a new stake in shares of Arista Networks during the 4th quarter worth $26,000. AdvisorNet Financial Inc lifted its position in shares of Arista Networks by 56.7% during the 3rd quarter. AdvisorNet Financial Inc now owns 199 shares of the technology company's stock worth $29,000 after purchasing an additional 72 shares during the last quarter. Knuff & Co LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Arista Networks during the 3rd quarter worth $29,000. Ameliora Wealth Management Ltd. purchased a new stake in shares of Arista Networks during the 4th quarter worth $30,000. Finally, Richardson Financial Services Inc. lifted its position in shares of Arista Networks by 141.3% during the 3rd quarter. Richardson Financial Services Inc. now owns 222 shares of the technology company's stock worth $32,000 after purchasing an additional 130 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 82.47% of the company's stock.

Arista Networks Price Performance

Shares of ANET opened at $147.27 on Friday. The stock has a market cap of $185.05 billion, a PE ratio of 53.36, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.58 and a beta of 1.48. Arista Networks, Inc. has a 1-year low of $66.59 and a 1-year high of $164.94. The firm has a fifty day moving average price of $133.97 and a 200 day moving average price of $135.91.

Arista Networks (NYSE:ANET - Get Free Report) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, February 12th. The technology company reported $0.82 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts' consensus estimates of $0.75 by $0.07. The company had revenue of $2.49 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.38 billion. Arista Networks had a net margin of 38.99% and a return on equity of 30.37%. Arista Networks's quarterly revenue was up 28.9% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $0.66 earnings per share. As a group, equities analysts expect that Arista Networks, Inc. will post 2.2 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several equities research analysts have recently issued reports on the stock. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their price objective on shares of Arista Networks from $175.00 to $185.00 and gave the stock an "overweight" rating in a research report on Friday, February 13th. Rosenblatt Securities raised shares of Arista Networks from a "neutral" rating to a "buy" rating and lifted their price objective for the stock from $165.00 to $180.00 in a research report on Tuesday. Needham & Company LLC lifted their price objective on shares of Arista Networks from $165.00 to $185.00 and gave the stock a "buy" rating in a research report on Friday, February 13th. KeyCorp reaffirmed an "overweight" rating and set a $178.00 price objective (up from $170.00) on shares of Arista Networks in a research report on Friday, February 13th. Finally, Evercore reaffirmed an "outperform" rating and set a $200.00 price objective on shares of Arista Networks in a research report on Friday, February 13th. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, nineteen have assigned a Buy rating and four have assigned a Hold rating to the company's stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Arista Networks presently has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average price target of $176.44.

Insider Buying and Selling at Arista Networks

In other Arista Networks news, insider Kenneth Duda sold 32,000 shares of Arista Networks stock in a transaction on Tuesday, March 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $134.14, for a total value of $4,292,480.00. Following the transaction, the insider directly owned 12,976 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,740,600.64. The trade was a 71.15% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, Director Charles H. Giancarlo sold 8,000 shares of Arista Networks stock in a transaction on Monday, February 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $140.43, for a total transaction of $1,123,440.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director owned 9,784 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,373,967.12. This represents a 44.98% decrease in their ownership of the stock. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. Over the last three months, insiders have sold 199,632 shares of company stock worth $26,873,604. 3.39% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

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.

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