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

Arista Networks, Inc. (NYSE:ANET) major shareholder Andreas Bechtolsheim sold 300,000 shares of the company’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 directly owned 180,843,048 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $36,638,801,524.80. This represents a 0.17% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this link. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Large shareholders that own more than 10% of a company’s stock are required to disclose their sales and purchases 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 shares were sold at an average price of $192.75, for a total transaction 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 transaction of $60,990,000.00.
• On Thursday, July 2nd, Andreas Bechtolsheim sold 240,000 shares of Arista Networks stock. The stock was sold at an average price of $162.67, for a total transaction of $39,040,800.00.
• On Wednesday, July 1st, Andreas Bechtolsheim sold 260,000 shares of Arista Networks stock. The shares were sold at an average price of $164.22, for a total transaction of $42,697,200.00.
• On Monday, June 15th, Andreas Bechtolsheim sold 260,000 shares of Arista Networks stock. The shares were 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 stock was 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 stock was sold at an average price of $163.06, for a total value of $39,134,400.00.

Arista Networks Trading Up 0.2%

NYSE:ANET traded up $0.36 during mid-day trading on Monday, hitting $195.74. 5,021,333 shares of the company’s stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 8,431,287. Arista Networks, Inc. has a 12 month low of $114.52 and a 12 month high of $214.89. The firm has a 50 day moving average of $180.28 and a two-hundred day moving average of $158.51. The firm has a market capitalization of $246.87 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 61.75, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.02 and a beta of 1.60.

Arista Networks (NYSE:ANET) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, August 4th. The technology company reported $1.02 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.89 by $0.13. Arista Networks had a net margin of 38.37% and a return on equity of 30.65%. The firm had revenue of $3.04 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.83 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the firm earned $0.73 EPS. The business’s revenue was up 37.7% on a year-over-year basis. Arista Networks has set its Q3 2026 guidance at 1.060-1.080 EPS. As a group, equities research analysts expect that Arista Networks, Inc. will post 3.7 earnings per share for the current year.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

ANET has been the subject of a number of analyst reports. Wolfe Research reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and set a $175.00 price objective on shares of Arista Networks in a report on Wednesday, June 10th. Truist Financial upped their target price on shares of Arista Networks from $175.00 to $234.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, August 5th. The Goldman Sachs Group reissued a “buy” rating and issued a $225.00 price target on shares of Arista Networks in a research report on Wednesday, August 5th. UBS Group restated a “buy” rating and set a $259.00 price target (up from $187.00) on shares of Arista Networks in a research note on Wednesday, August 5th. Finally, Citigroup reaffirmed a “buy” rating on shares of Arista Networks in a report on Thursday, August 6th. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-two have issued a Buy rating and one has assigned a Hold rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Buy” and a consensus target price of $225.76.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Brighton Jones LLC grew its holdings in shares of Arista Networks by 321.7% in the 4th quarter. Brighton Jones LLC now owns 7,806 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $863,000 after purchasing an additional 5,955 shares during the last quarter. Revolve Wealth Partners LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Arista Networks during the 4th quarter worth about $202,000. Bison Wealth LLC bought a new position in Arista Networks during the 4th quarter valued at about $251,000. Sivia Capital Partners LLC lifted its holdings in Arista Networks by 48.4% during the 2nd quarter. Sivia Capital Partners LLC now owns 10,723 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $1,097,000 after purchasing an additional 3,496 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Gamco Investors INC. ET AL boosted its position in Arista Networks by 31.3% in the second quarter. Gamco Investors INC. ET AL now owns 4,193 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $429,000 after buying an additional 1,000 shares in the last quarter. 82.47% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Arista Networks Company 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.