Kovack Advisors Inc. Buys 6,120 Shares of Arista Networks, Inc. $ANET

Kovack Advisors Inc. raised its position in shares of Arista Networks, Inc. (NYSE:ANET) by 48.8% in the third quarter, according to its most recent filing with the SEC. The firm owned 18,666 shares of the technology company’s stock after purchasing an additional 6,120 shares during the quarter. Kovack Advisors Inc.’s holdings in Arista Networks were worth $2,720,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently modified their holdings of the company. Bare Financial Services Inc increased its position in shares of Arista Networks by 2,118.2% during the second quarter. Bare Financial Services Inc now owns 244 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $25,000 after buying an additional 233 shares during the period. AdvisorNet Financial Inc boosted its position in Arista Networks by 56.7% during the third quarter. AdvisorNet Financial Inc now owns 199 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $29,000 after acquiring an additional 72 shares during the last quarter. Richardson Financial Services Inc. boosted its position in Arista Networks by 141.3% during the third quarter. Richardson Financial Services Inc. now owns 222 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $32,000 after acquiring an additional 130 shares during the last quarter. SJS Investment Consulting Inc. grew its holdings in Arista Networks by 979.2% during the 3rd quarter. SJS Investment Consulting Inc. now owns 259 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $38,000 after acquiring an additional 235 shares during the period. Finally, Solstein Capital LLC raised its position in shares of Arista Networks by 493.8% in the 2nd quarter. Solstein Capital LLC now owns 380 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $39,000 after acquiring an additional 316 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 82.47% of the company’s stock.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, Director Charles H. Giancarlo sold 8,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, February 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $140.43, for a total value of $1,123,440.00. Following the sale, the director owned 9,784 shares in the company, valued at $1,373,967.12. This represents a 44.98% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at 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 shares were sold at an average price of $124.55, for a total value of $2,994,431.10. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer owned 9,917 shares in the company, valued at $1,235,162.35. This represents a 70.80% decrease in their position. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. Over the last 90 days, insiders have sold 218,042 shares of company stock worth $28,561,131. Insiders own 3.39% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several brokerages recently commented on ANET. KeyCorp restated an “overweight” rating and set a $178.00 target price (up previously from $170.00) on shares of Arista Networks in a research report on Friday, February 13th. Barclays reissued an “overweight” rating and issued a $184.00 price target (up from $183.00) on shares of Arista Networks in a research note on Friday, February 13th. Weiss Ratings restated a “hold (c+)” rating on shares of Arista Networks in a report on Monday, December 29th. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their price objective on shares of Arista Networks from $175.00 to $185.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Friday, February 13th. Finally, Needham & Company LLC boosted their target price on shares of Arista Networks from $165.00 to $185.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, February 13th. Seventeen investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and five have given a Hold rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $175.44.

Arista Networks Stock Performance

Shares of Arista Networks stock opened at $136.97 on Friday. The stock has a market capitalization of $172.11 billion, a PE ratio of 49.63, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.35 and a beta of 1.42. Arista Networks, Inc. has a 52 week low of $59.43 and a 52 week high of $164.94. The stock has a 50 day moving average price of $133.75 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $137.42.

Arista Networks (NYSE:ANET) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, February 12th. The technology company reported $0.82 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.75 by $0.07. Arista Networks had a return on equity of 30.37% and a net margin of 38.99%.The company had revenue of $2.49 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.38 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the firm earned $0.66 earnings per share. Arista Networks’s revenue for the quarter was up 28.9% on a year-over-year basis. Research analysts forecast that Arista Networks, Inc. will post 2.2 EPS for the current year.

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.