Insider Selling: Arista Networks (NYSE:ANET) Major Shareholder Sells $60,780,000.00 in Stock

Key Points

• Major shareholder Andreas Bechtolsheim sold 300,000 Arista Networks shares at an average price of $202.60, generating $60.78 million. The transaction was made under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 plan and reduced his ownership by 0.17%, leaving him with about 180.84 million shares.
• Arista shares traded at $195.74, near their 52-week high, with a market capitalization of approximately $246.87 billion. The company recently exceeded quarterly earnings and revenue expectations, reporting $1.02 EPS and $3.04 billion in revenue, up 37.7% year over year.
• Analysts remain broadly bullish: 22 rate the stock a Buy and two rate it a Strong Buy, with a consensus price target of $225.76. Several firms recently raised their targets to between $240 and $280.

Arista Networks, Inc. (NYSE:ANET - Get Free Report) major shareholder Andreas Bechtolsheim sold 300,000 shares of the business's stock in a transaction on Thursday, August 27th. The stock was sold at an average price of $202.60, for a total transaction of $60,780,000.00. Following the sale, the insider owned 180,843,048 shares in the company, valued at $36,638,801,524.80. The trade was a 0.17% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Major shareholders that own 10% or more of a company's shares are required to disclose their transactions with the SEC.

Andreas Bechtolsheim also recently made the following trade(s):

• On Thursday, August 6th, Andreas Bechtolsheim sold 111,848 shares of Arista Networks stock. The stock was sold at an average price of $192.75, for a total value of $21,558,702.00.
• On Wednesday, August 5th, Andreas Bechtolsheim sold 300,000 shares of Arista Networks stock. The stock was sold at an average price of $203.30, for a total value of $60,990,000.00.
• On Thursday, July 2nd, Andreas Bechtolsheim sold 240,000 shares of Arista Networks stock. The shares were sold at an average price of $162.67, for a total value of $39,040,800.00.
• On Wednesday, July 1st, Andreas Bechtolsheim sold 260,000 shares of Arista Networks stock. The stock was sold at an average price of $164.22, for a total value of $42,697,200.00.
• On Monday, June 15th, Andreas Bechtolsheim sold 260,000 shares of Arista Networks stock. The stock was sold at an average price of $165.57, for a total value of $43,048,200.00.
• On Friday, June 5th, Andreas Bechtolsheim sold 220,000 shares of Arista Networks stock. The shares were sold at an average price of $157.93, for a total value of $34,744,600.00.
• On Thursday, June 4th, Andreas Bechtolsheim sold 240,000 shares of Arista Networks stock. The shares were sold at an average price of $163.06, for a total value of $39,134,400.00.

Arista Networks Trading Up 0.2%

Shares of NYSE:ANET traded up $0.36 during midday trading on Monday, hitting $195.74. 5,021,333 shares of the stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 8,431,287. Arista Networks, Inc. has a twelve month low of $114.52 and a twelve month high of $214.89. The company has a 50 day moving average price of $180.28 and a 200-day moving average price of $158.51. The stock has a market cap of $246.87 billion, a P/E ratio of 61.75, a PEG ratio of 2.02 and a beta of 1.60.

Arista Networks (NYSE:ANET - Get Free Report) last posted its 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. The firm had revenue of $3.04 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.83 billion. Arista Networks had a net margin of 38.37% and a return on equity of 30.65%. The firm's revenue for the quarter was up 37.7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the firm posted $0.73 EPS. Arista Networks has set its Q3 2026 guidance at 1.060-1.080 EPS. On average, equities research analysts expect that Arista Networks, Inc. will post 3.7 earnings per share for the current year.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several research analysts recently issued reports on the company. Rosenblatt Securities upped their target price on Arista Networks from $210.00 to $280.00 and gave the company a "buy" rating in a research note on Wednesday, August 5th. Wells Fargo & Company reissued an "overweight" rating and issued a $255.00 price target (up from $200.00) on shares of Arista Networks in a report on Wednesday, August 5th. Needham & Company LLC restated a "buy" rating and issued a $260.00 price objective (up from $200.00) on shares of Arista Networks in a research report on Wednesday, August 5th. Bank of America reaffirmed a "buy" rating and set a $240.00 price objective (up from $200.00) on shares of Arista Networks in a research note on Wednesday, August 5th. Finally, Piper Sandler reissued an "overweight" rating and issued a $240.00 target price (up from $181.00) on shares of Arista Networks in a research note on Wednesday, August 5th. Two investment 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 MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of "Buy" and a consensus target price of $225.76.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of large investors have recently made changes to their positions in the business. Lighthouse Financial Services Inc. ADV acquired a new position in Arista Networks during the fourth quarter worth $1,549,000. Bensler LLC bought a new position in Arista Networks during the fourth quarter valued at about $6,350,000. QRG Capital Management Inc. lifted its position in shares of Arista Networks by 6.4% in the fourth quarter. QRG Capital Management Inc. now owns 169,613 shares of the technology company's stock worth $22,224,000 after buying an additional 10,217 shares during the last quarter. Jefferies Financial Group Inc. boosted its stake in shares of Arista Networks by 59.8% during the 4th quarter. Jefferies Financial Group Inc. now owns 17,621 shares of the technology company's stock worth $2,309,000 after acquiring an additional 6,591 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Reaves W H & Co. Inc. bought a new stake in shares of Arista Networks during the 4th quarter worth about $3,058,000. 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.

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