Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) Trading 2% Higher – Here’s What Happened

Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) shares were up 2% during trading on Tuesday . The company traded as high as $181.11 and last traded at $179.61. Approximately 23,046,734 shares changed hands during trading, a decline of 24% from the average daily volume of 30,176,909 shares. The stock had previously closed at $176.09.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

GOOGL has been the subject of several research reports. Citigroup raised their target price on Alphabet from $195.00 to $200.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, April 25th. Tigress Financial upped their price target on Alphabet from $220.00 to $240.00 and gave the company a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, April 30th. Sanford C. Bernstein upped their target price on Alphabet from $165.00 to $185.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a research report on Friday, April 25th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lowered their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $220.00 to $180.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research note on Tuesday, April 8th. Finally, Westpark Capital reiterated a “buy” rating and set a $210.00 target price on shares of Alphabet in a research report on Thursday, May 8th. Ten research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-six have assigned a buy rating and four have issued a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $199.75.

Alphabet Price Performance

The stock has a market capitalization of $2.16 trillion, a P/E ratio of 22.16, a PEG ratio of 1.34 and a beta of 1.01. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.03, a quick ratio of 1.84 and a current ratio of 1.84. The business has a fifty day simple moving average of $160.52 and a 200-day simple moving average of $174.46.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, April 24th. The information services provider reported $2.81 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.02 by $0.79. The business had revenue of $76.49 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $89.30 billion. Alphabet had a net margin of 28.60% and a return on equity of 32.49%. During the same period in the prior year, the company posted $1.89 EPS. Sell-side analysts expect that Alphabet Inc. will post 8.9 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Alphabet Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, June 16th. Investors of record on Monday, June 9th will be issued a $0.21 dividend. This represents a $0.84 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.47%. This is a positive change from Alphabet’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.20. The ex-dividend date is Monday, June 9th. Alphabet’s dividend payout ratio is currently 9.36%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Alphabet

In other Alphabet news, CAO Amie Thuener O’toole sold 673 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, April 1st. The shares were sold at an average price of $155.33, for a total value of $104,537.09. Following the sale, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 15,303 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,377,014.99. This represents a 4.21% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. Also, CEO Sundar Pichai sold 32,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, May 7th. The shares were sold at an average price of $155.90, for a total transaction of $5,066,750.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 2,652,696 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $413,555,306.40. This represents a 1.21% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 195,770 shares of company stock valued at $32,036,638 in the last quarter. 11.64% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Institutional Trading of Alphabet

Several hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the business. Osterweis Capital Management Inc. raised its stake in shares of Alphabet by 2.0% during the 1st quarter. Osterweis Capital Management Inc. now owns 4,912 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $760,000 after buying an additional 95 shares in the last quarter. CBIZ Investment Advisory Services LLC grew its stake in shares of Alphabet by 28.3% during the 1st quarter. CBIZ Investment Advisory Services LLC now owns 3,089 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $478,000 after purchasing an additional 681 shares during the period. Modern Wealth Management LLC increased its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 23.0% in the 1st quarter. Modern Wealth Management LLC now owns 65,087 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $10,065,000 after purchasing an additional 12,189 shares in the last quarter. Jones Financial Companies Lllp boosted its holdings in Alphabet by 36.8% during the first quarter. Jones Financial Companies Lllp now owns 1,814,959 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $280,190,000 after buying an additional 488,549 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Silicon Valley Capital Partners grew its position in Alphabet by 10.6% during the first quarter. Silicon Valley Capital Partners now owns 276,145 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $42,617,000 after buying an additional 26,456 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 40.03% of the company’s stock.

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.