Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) Director Sells $284,700.00 in Stock

Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) Director John L. Hennessy sold 1,500 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Monday, January 13th. The stock was sold at an average price of $189.80, for a total transaction of $284,700.00. Following the transaction, the director now owns 21,824 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $4,142,195.20. This represents a 6.43 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link.

Alphabet Trading Up 3.1 %

NASDAQ:GOOGL opened at $195.55 on Thursday. The firm has a 50-day moving average price of $183.45 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $173.04. 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 Inc. has a 52 week low of $130.66 and a 52 week high of $201.42. The firm has a market cap of $2.39 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 25.94, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.35 and a beta of 0.98.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, October 29th. The information services provider reported $2.12 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.83 by $0.29. Alphabet had a net margin of 27.74% and a return on equity of 31.66%. The company had revenue of $88.27 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $72.85 billion. During the same quarter last year, the business posted $1.55 EPS. On average, equities analysts expect that Alphabet Inc. will post 8.01 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Alphabet Announces Dividend

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

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Alphabet

Several large investors have recently modified their holdings of the stock. Lantz Financial LLC boosted its holdings in Alphabet by 10.8% in the 2nd quarter. Lantz Financial LLC now owns 4,622 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $842,000 after buying an additional 452 shares during the period. Spectrum Wealth Advisory Group LLC bought a new position in Alphabet in the 2nd quarter worth approximately $218,000. Vance Wealth Inc. boosted its holdings in Alphabet by 4.0% in the 2nd quarter. Vance Wealth Inc. now owns 3,089 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $563,000 after buying an additional 119 shares during the period. Tobam boosted its holdings in Alphabet by 64.3% in the 2nd quarter. Tobam now owns 24,833 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $4,523,000 after purchasing an additional 9,718 shares during the period. Finally, D.A. Davidson & CO. boosted its holdings in Alphabet by 4.8% in the 2nd quarter. D.A. Davidson & CO. now owns 427,320 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $77,836,000 after purchasing an additional 19,423 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 40.03% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of brokerages have recently issued reports on GOOGL. Royal Bank of Canada upped their target price on shares of Alphabet from $204.00 to $210.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Evercore ISI upped their target price on shares of Alphabet from $200.00 to $205.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Stifel Nicolaus upped their target price on shares of Alphabet from $200.00 to $225.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Monday. BMO Capital Markets reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and issued a $217.00 target price (up from $215.00) on shares of Alphabet in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Finally, Robert W. Baird reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and issued a $205.00 target price on shares of Alphabet in a report on Tuesday, December 10th. Nine equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, thirty have issued a buy rating and four have issued a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $208.15.

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.