Cantor Fitzgerald Lifts Earnings Estimates for Alphabet

Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) – Research analysts at Cantor Fitzgerald increased their FY2024 earnings per share estimates for shares of Alphabet in a note issued to investors on Tuesday, January 7th. Cantor Fitzgerald analyst D. Mathivanan now expects that the information services provider will earn $8.06 per share for the year, up from their previous estimate of $7.96. The consensus estimate for Alphabet’s current full-year earnings is $8.02 per share.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOG) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 29th. The information services provider reported $2.12 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.83 by $0.29. The company had revenue of $88.27 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $86.39 billion. Alphabet had a net margin of 27.74% and a return on equity of 31.66%. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 15.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the firm earned $1.55 earnings per share.

Several other brokerages have also recently issued reports on GOOG. Canaccord Genuity Group increased their target price on Alphabet from $220.00 to $225.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Oppenheimer raised their price objective on Alphabet from $185.00 to $215.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Barclays increased their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $200.00 to $220.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Phillip Securities raised shares of Alphabet to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Friday, November 1st. Finally, Pivotal Research upped their target price on Alphabet from $215.00 to $225.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Six equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, thirteen have given a buy rating and three have assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Alphabet presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $200.56.

Alphabet Price Performance

Shares of GOOG opened at $196.71 on Wednesday. The stock has a market capitalization of $2.41 trillion, a PE ratio of 26.09, a PEG ratio of 1.34 and a beta of 0.99. The company has a 50 day moving average price of $182.87 and a 200-day moving average price of $174.23. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.04, a quick ratio of 1.95 and a current ratio of 1.95. Alphabet has a fifty-two week low of $131.55 and a fifty-two week high of $202.88.

Institutional Trading of Alphabet

A number of institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in GOOG. FMR LLC lifted its holdings in Alphabet by 5.2% in the 3rd quarter. FMR LLC now owns 114,802,133 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $19,193,768,000 after purchasing an additional 5,655,022 shares in the last quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC raised its position in shares of Alphabet by 10.3% in the third quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC now owns 33,334,082 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $5,573,125,000 after buying an additional 3,113,395 shares during the last quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. lifted its stake in shares of Alphabet by 65.9% in the third quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 6,294,332 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $1,052,349,000 after buying an additional 2,500,621 shares in the last quarter. Canada Pension Plan Investment Board boosted its position in Alphabet by 27.8% during the second quarter. Canada Pension Plan Investment Board now owns 7,499,245 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $1,375,512,000 after acquiring an additional 1,632,691 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Healthcare of Ontario Pension Plan Trust Fund grew its stake in Alphabet by 182.1% during the 3rd quarter. Healthcare of Ontario Pension Plan Trust Fund now owns 2,526,055 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $422,331,000 after acquiring an additional 1,630,701 shares in the last quarter. 27.26% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Insider Activity

In other news, Director Kavitark Ram Shriram sold 37,134 shares of Alphabet stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, December 10th. The shares were sold at an average price of $185.02, for a total value of $6,870,532.68. Following the sale, the director now owns 282,832 shares in the company, valued at $52,329,576.64. This trade represents a 11.61 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. Also, CAO Amie Thuener O’toole sold 1,368 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, January 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $191.55, for a total transaction of $262,040.40. Following the transaction, the chief accounting officer now owns 20,681 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,961,445.55. This trade represents a 6.20 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 155,887 shares of company stock worth $27,996,356 over the last three months. 12.99% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Alphabet Announces Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, December 16th. Shareholders of record on Monday, December 9th were issued a $0.20 dividend. This represents a $0.80 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.41%. The ex-dividend date was Monday, December 9th. Alphabet’s payout ratio is currently 10.61%.

Alphabet Company Profile

Alphabet Inc offers various products and platforms in the United States, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, the Asia-Pacific, Canada, and Latin America. It operates through Google Services, Google Cloud, and Other Bets segments. The Google Services segment provides products and services, including ads, Android, Chrome, devices, Gmail, Google Drive, Google Maps, Google Photos, Google Play, Search, and YouTube.