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

Shares of Arista Networks, Inc. (NYSE:ANET) dropped 3.5% during mid-day trading on Thursday . The stock traded as low as $132.01 and last traded at $135.7880. Approximately 14,878,760 shares traded hands during mid-day trading, an increase of 74% from the average daily volume of 8,551,547 shares. The stock had previously closed at $140.66.

More Arista Networks News

Here are the key news stories impacting Arista Networks this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Reported stronger-than-expected Q4 results: EPS $0.82 vs. $0.75 est., revenue $2.49B (+28.9% YoY) and record net income; company raised AI revenue targets and issued revenue guidance above Street estimates, supporting the AI-driven growth narrative. Read More.
• Positive Sentiment: Analysts are lifting price targets and turning more bullish (Wells Fargo, Needham, Rosenblatt among those raising targets/ratings), giving additional analyst-driven momentum to the stock. Read More.
• Positive Sentiment: Market views Arista as outperforming peers (notably Cisco) by managing supply-chain pressures and capturing hyperscaler AI capex, which supports margin resilience and share gains. Read More.
• Neutral Sentiment: Management said Arista is diversifying accelerator support: deployments that were ~99% Nvidia a year ago now include ~20–25% AMD — a strategic shift that increases customer options but alters vendor dynamics. Traders note this may be weighing on GPU vendor stocks while benefiting Arista’s flexibility. Read More.
• Neutral Sentiment: Unusually high options activity is signaling elevated trader interest/positioning ahead of and after earnings. Read More.
• Negative Sentiment: Valuation is rich (ANET trades at a high P/E), and some commentary asks whether the recent run (one-year gains) leaves less margin for error if growth slows. This could temper longer-term upside. Read More.
• Negative Sentiment: Rising component/memory costs are a sector-wide headwind; management says it’s mitigating impacts via purchase commitments, but cost pressure remains a watch item for margins. Read More.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several analysts recently commented on the company. Barclays reaffirmed an “overweight” rating and issued a $184.00 price objective (up previously from $183.00) on shares of Arista Networks in a report on Friday. Weiss Ratings reaffirmed a “hold (c+)” rating on shares of Arista Networks in a research report on Monday, December 29th. Needham & Company LLC upped their target price on shares of Arista Networks from $165.00 to $185.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday. KeyCorp reiterated an “overweight” rating and set a $178.00 price target (up previously from $170.00) on shares of Arista Networks in a research note on Friday. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group reissued a “buy” rating and set a $188.00 price objective (up previously from $165.00) on shares of Arista Networks in a research report on Friday. Eighteen analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and five have issued a Hold rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $175.41.

Arista Networks Price Performance

The firm has a 50-day moving average of $133.05 and a 200-day moving average of $136.87. The stock has a market cap of $178.13 billion, a PE ratio of 51.25, a PEG ratio of 2.28 and a beta of 1.42.

Arista Networks (NYSE:ANET) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, February 12th. The technology company reported $0.82 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.75 by $0.07. The business had revenue of $2.49 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.38 billion. Arista Networks had a return on equity of 31.34% and a net margin of 38.99%.The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 28.9% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the company posted $0.66 EPS. Equities analysts forecast that Arista Networks, Inc. will post 2.2 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling at Arista Networks

In other Arista Networks news, insider Kenneth Duda sold 30,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, December 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $123.16, for a total transaction of $3,694,800.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider owned 12,976 shares in the company, valued at $1,598,124.16. This trade represents a 69.81% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Also, Director Charles H. Giancarlo sold 8,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, February 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $140.43, for a total value of $1,123,440.00. Following the sale, the director directly owned 9,784 shares in the company, valued at $1,373,967.12. This trade represents a 44.98% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. Insiders sold 216,464 shares of company stock valued at $27,553,548 in the last 90 days. Insiders own 3.39% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Arista Networks

Several large investors have recently bought and sold shares of the business. Bare Financial Services Inc raised its position in shares of Arista Networks by 2,118.2% during the 2nd quarter. Bare Financial Services Inc now owns 244 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $25,000 after buying an additional 233 shares in the last quarter. Board of the Pension Protection Fund purchased a new stake in Arista Networks during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $26,000. AdvisorNet Financial Inc raised 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 purchasing an additional 72 shares during the period. Knuff & Co LLC bought a new stake in shares of Arista Networks in the 3rd quarter valued at approximately $29,000. Finally, Ameliora Wealth Management Ltd. bought a new position in shares of Arista Networks during the 4th quarter valued at approximately $30,000. 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.