Arista Networks (NYSE:ANET) Receives "Buy" Rating from Needham & Company LLC

Arista Networks (NYSE:ANET - Get Free Report)'s stock had its "buy" rating restated by investment analysts at Needham & Company LLC in a research note issued on Wednesday,Benzinga reports. They currently have a $145.00 target price on the technology company's stock. Needham & Company LLC's price target would suggest a potential upside of 47.50% from the stock's current price.

ANET has been the topic of a number of other research reports. Evercore ISI boosted their price target on shares of Arista Networks from $110.00 to $130.00 and gave the stock an "outperform" rating in a research report on Friday, January 17th. Morgan Stanley boosted their price target on shares of Arista Networks from $102.50 to $118.00 and gave the stock an "overweight" rating in a research report on Tuesday, December 17th. The Goldman Sachs Group boosted their price target on shares of Arista Networks from $120.00 to $135.00 and gave the stock a "buy" rating in a research report on Friday, January 17th. Wells Fargo & Company boosted their price target on shares of Arista Networks from $97.50 to $115.00 and gave the stock an "overweight" rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Finally, Barclays cut their target price on shares of Arista Networks from $495.00 to $125.00 and set an "overweight" rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, December 4th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have given a hold rating and twelve have given a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Arista Networks presently has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus target price of $113.79.

Arista Networks Trading Down 4.9 %

ANET traded down $5.10 during trading on Wednesday, reaching $98.31. 13,984,341 shares of the company's stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 10,062,921. Arista Networks has a one year low of $60.08 and a one year high of $133.57. The stock has a market capitalization of $123.84 billion, a PE ratio of 44.28, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.79 and a beta of 1.09. The firm has a fifty day moving average price of $113.94 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $101.57.

Arista Networks (NYSE:ANET - Get Free Report) last posted its earnings results on Tuesday, February 18th. The technology company reported $0.59 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts' consensus estimates of $0.57 by $0.02. The firm had revenue of $1.93 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.90 billion. Arista Networks had a net margin of 40.72% and a return on equity of 29.91%. Sell-side analysts expect that Arista Networks will post 2.18 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling at Arista Networks

In other Arista Networks news, SVP Kenneth Duda sold 80,000 shares of the firm's stock in a transaction on Friday, December 6th. The shares were sold at an average price of $108.29, for a total value of $8,663,200.00. Following the transaction, the senior vice president now directly owns 12,976 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $1,405,171.04. This trade represents a 86.04 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, Director Charles H. Giancarlo sold 8,000 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Thursday, January 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $111.51, for a total transaction of $892,080.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director now owns 163,784 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $18,263,553.84. This represents a 4.66 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last three months, insiders have sold 260,056 shares of company stock valued at $30,225,623. Corporate insiders own 3.54% of the company's stock.

Institutional Trading of Arista Networks

A number of large investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Vanguard Group Inc. increased its holdings in Arista Networks by 304.2% during the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 96,084,951 shares of the technology company's stock worth $10,620,270,000 after buying an additional 72,311,318 shares during the last quarter. FMR LLC increased its holdings in Arista Networks by 330.9% during the fourth quarter. FMR LLC now owns 57,648,129 shares of the technology company's stock worth $6,371,848,000 after buying an additional 44,269,572 shares during the last quarter. Cresset Asset Management LLC increased its holdings in Arista Networks by 277.5% during the fourth quarter. Cresset Asset Management LLC now owns 27,288,583 shares of the technology company's stock worth $3,016,207,000 after buying an additional 20,059,303 shares during the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC increased its stake in shares of Arista Networks by 311.6% in the fourth quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 24,165,355 shares of the technology company's stock worth $2,665,829,000 after purchasing an additional 18,293,874 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Alliancebernstein L.P. increased its stake in shares of Arista Networks by 218.5% in the fourth quarter. Alliancebernstein L.P. now owns 21,070,016 shares of the technology company's stock worth $2,328,869,000 after purchasing an additional 14,454,822 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 82.47% of the company's stock.

Arista Networks Company Profile

Arista Networks, Inc engages in the development, marketing, and sale of data-driven, client to cloud networking solutions for data center, campus, and routing environments in the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and the Asia-Pacific. Its cloud networking solutions consist of Extensible Operating System (EOS), a publish-subscribe state-sharing networking operating system offered in combination with a set of network applications.