Arista Networks (NYSE:ANET) Approves Stock Repurchase Program

Arista Networks (NYSE:ANET) declared that its board has initiated a share repurchase plan on Tuesday, May 6th, RTT News reports. The company plans to repurchase $1.50 billion in shares. This repurchase authorization allows the technology company to purchase up to 1.3% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase plans are usually an indication that the company’s management believes its shares are undervalued.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several research firms have recently weighed in on ANET. Citigroup lifted their price objective on Arista Networks from $92.00 to $97.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday. KGI Securities downgraded Arista Networks to a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday. Morgan Stanley raised their price target on Arista Networks from $73.00 to $100.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, May 1st. Piper Sandler reissued a “neutral” rating and issued a $89.00 price objective (up previously from $76.00) on shares of Arista Networks in a research report on Wednesday. Finally, Evercore ISI decreased their price target on shares of Arista Networks from $130.00 to $100.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research note on Tuesday, April 15th. Five analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and twelve have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $106.57.

Arista Networks Stock Performance

Shares of NYSE:ANET opened at $86.51 on Thursday. The firm has a market cap of $108.62 billion, a PE ratio of 38.97, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.10 and a beta of 1.38. Arista Networks has a 52 week low of $59.43 and a 52 week high of $133.58. The firm’s fifty day moving average is $78.89 and its 200-day moving average is $97.50.

Arista Networks (NYSE:ANET) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, May 6th. The technology company reported $0.65 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.59 by $0.06. Arista Networks had a return on equity of 29.91% and a net margin of 40.72%. The company had revenue of $2 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.97 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $0.50 earnings per share. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 27.6% on a year-over-year basis. Sell-side analysts forecast that Arista Networks will post 2.2 EPS for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling at Arista Networks

In related news, Director Charles H. Giancarlo sold 8,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, March 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $89.03, for a total value of $712,240.00. Following the transaction, the director now directly owns 147,784 shares in the company, valued at $13,157,209.52. This trade represents a 5.14 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. Also, Director Kelly Bodnar Battles sold 1,488 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Friday, February 14th. The shares were sold at an average price of $107.13, for a total transaction of $159,409.44. Following the sale, the director now owns 8,128 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $870,752.64. This trade represents a 15.47 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last quarter, insiders have sold 332,355 shares of company stock valued at $30,010,479. 3.39% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

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.