We recently published a list of Top 10 AI Stocks to Watch After Latest Earnings and Analyst Ratings. Since Arista Networks Inc (NYSE:ANET) ranks 10th on the list, it deserves a deeper look.
Tom Lee, Fundstrat Global Advisors co-founder, said while talking to CNBC in a latest program that the next few weeks until the US election would be “confusing” for many since no one could say anything with conviction about who is going to be in the White House.
Lee said that the market is going to trade “well” into the upcoming Fed meeting where he expects “some” rate cuts amid the labor market needing support and positive inflation data. Asked whether he expects a 25bps rate cut or a 50bps cut, Lee said:
“ A 25 or 50 can have both hawkish or dovish implications so I think it’s ultimately whether Fed Chair Powell comes across as this is the start of a cycle they are confident that we are moving back towards neutral and whatever number they make is quite dovish and positive but if it seems like that it’s dragging along the FOMC members and then there is even concerns about hard landing then I think the market can view anything they do as negative,” Lee said.
However, Lee said he believes the outcome would be positive.
For this article, we chose the top 10 buzzing AI stocks on the back of the latest earnings and analyst ratings. With each company, we have mentioned the number of hedge fund investors. Why are we interested in the stocks that hedge funds pile into? The reason is simple: our research has shown that we can outperform the market by imitating the top stock picks of the best hedge funds. Our quarterly newsletter’s strategy selects 14 small-cap and large-cap stocks every quarter and has returned 275% since May 2014, beating its benchmark by 150 percentage points (see more details here).
A technician in a server room managing a large-scale network of computers.
Arista Networks Inc (NYSE:ANET)
Number of Hedge Fund Investors: 65
The Information recently reported that Meta Platforms is preparing a cluster of over 100,000 NVIDIA H-100 GPUs to train the latest version of its Llama language model. Evercore ISI believes Arista Networks is likely to be the networking partner for Meta Platforms’ cluster. Ethernet will handle the networking for the project, as InfiniBand isn’t capable of supporting a cluster of this scale, leading Evercore to believe Arista will supply some of the infrastructure.
“Assuming GPU’s represent 80% of total spend on this AI cluster, this would imply total cost of around $2.5B, of which 10% is likely spent on infrastructure,” said Evercore analyst Amit Daryanani, in a note. “This could represent a $250M revenue opportunity for Arista, if they won the business.”
Arista has previously worked with Meta, providing switches for a cluster with 24,000 GPUs. Daryanani noted that their strong relationship makes it likely Arista will supply the switches for this new cluster. If successful, this could boost Arista’s $750 million AI revenue target for 2025. Evercore maintains an Outperform rating on Arista with a $400 price target.
What makes Arista a promising AI stock?
Arista Networks Inc (NYSE:ANET) is set to gain amid the AI-driven shift to high-speed networks due to its open Ethernet design and unified Arista EOS. The company’s partnership with Broadcom also created an opportunity for Arista Networks Inc (NYSE:ANET) to expand its integrated software and hardware solutions.
Arista Networks Inc (NYSE:ANET) claims its Ethernet architecture based on merchant silicon allows fast deployment for major hyperscalers and Tier-2 cloud providers.
During Q1 earnings call, Arista Networks Inc (NYSE:ANET) management said it targets $750 million in AI revenue by 2025.
Ethernet at scale is becoming the de facto network and premier choice for scale-out AI training workloads. A good AI network needs a good data strategy delivered by a highly differentiated EOS and network data lake architecture. We are therefore becoming increasingly constructive about achieving our AI target of 750 million in 2025. In summary, as we continue to set the direction of Arista 2.0 networking, our visibility to new AI and cloud projects is improving, and our enterprise and provider activity continues to progress well.
Read the full earnings call transcript here.
Despite Nvidia’s integrated Ethernet approach with Spectrum-X, Arista Networks Inc (NYSE:ANET) is confident about its scalable AI solutions using Jericho-based platforms, which could drive broader market adoption. Arista Networks Inc (NYSE:ANET) EOS offers a unified interface for various network applications, making it a reliable choice for cloud providers.
Arista Networks Inc (NYSE:ANET) does not see Nvidia as a direct competitor in the Ethernet space yet. Playing on its strengths instead of competing against a giant gives it a strong position in the market.
Madison Mid Cap Fund stated the following regarding Arista Networks, Inc. (NYSE:ANET) in its Q2 2024 investor letter:
“We trimmed our positions in Arista Networks, Inc. (NYSE: ANET) and Carlisle Companies. Both of these companies have witnessed strong multi-year growth in their stock prices, which have resulted in elevated valuations. While we remain confident in the long-term prospects of both of these businesses, we trimmed our holdings to more appropriate position sizes given the risk/reward offered.”
Overall, Arista Networks Inc (NYSE:ANET) ranks 10th on Insider Monkey’s list titled Top 10 AI Stocks to Watch After Latest Earnings and Analyst Ratings. While we acknowledge the potential of Arista Networks Inc (NYSE:ANET), our conviction lies in the belief that AI stocks hold greater promise for delivering higher returns, and doing so within a shorter timeframe. If you are looking for an AI stock that is more promising than ANET but that trades at less than 5 times its earnings, check out our report about the cheapest AI stock.
READ NEXT: Analyst Sees a New $25 Billion “Opportunity” for NVIDIA and Jim Cramer is Recommending These Stocks.
Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.