Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) Shares Climb 1.8% – Time to Buy?

Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL)’s stock price traded up 1.8% on Thursday. The stock traded as high as $302.56 and last traded at $298.70. Approximately 35,092,425 shares traded hands during trading, an increase of 12% from the average daily volume of 31,472,260 shares. The stock had previously closed at $293.45.

Alphabet News Summary

Investors following GOOGL have been watching these news items:

• Positive Sentiment: Custom AI chips could add a growth engine. Alphabet’s new TPU systems may help it compete with Nvidia and support its own AI workloads. One analysis argues investors may be underestimating the potential of the chip business. Alphabet’s Misunderstood TPUs Are a Hidden Catalyst Investors Haven’t Yet Noticed Alphabet Escalates AI Chip Rivalry With NVIDIA
• Positive Sentiment: Berkshire’s buying signals investor confidence. A report says Berkshire Hathaway has bought more than 60 million Alphabet shares since Greg Abel became CEO, with Alphabet among the largest holdings in its portfolio. Warren Buffett’s Successor, Greg Abel, Has Nearly $110 Billion Invested in These 2 Tech Stocks
• Positive Sentiment: Cloud and infrastructure expansion support the growth case. Coverage points to Google Cloud’s strong growth and plans for major Nordic data-center investment, where available power and permitting could aid AI capacity expansion. Alphabet’s Cloud Business Doubled, but the Stock Plunged Google’s $13 Billion Nordic Bet Points to a New Global Front in the AI Power Race

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several analysts have recently issued reports on GOOGL shares. The Goldman Sachs Group reiterated a “buy” rating and issued a $385.00 target price on shares of Alphabet in a research note on Thursday, October 29th. DZ Bank raised shares of Alphabet to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, July 23rd. Zacks Research cut shares of Alphabet from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Tuesday, August 11th. KeyCorp reduced their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $410.00 to $385.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, October 29th. Finally, Wall Street Zen lowered shares of Alphabet from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Saturday, August 1st. Five equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, forty-five have assigned a Buy rating and five have given a Hold rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, Alphabet currently has a consensus rating of “Buy” and an average price target of $412.51.

Alphabet Stock Up 1.8%

The stock has a 50 day moving average price of $329.89 and a 200 day moving average price of $338.38. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.19, a quick ratio of 2.69 and a current ratio of 2.79. The company has a market capitalization of $3.67 trillion, a P/E ratio of 15.59, a PEG ratio of 0.87 and a beta of 1.23.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, October 28th. The information services provider reported $2.12 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $3.02 by ($0.90). Alphabet had a net margin of 50.03% and a return on equity of 43.33%. The company had revenue of $127.58 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $127.96 billion. Equities research analysts forecast that Alphabet Inc. will post 19.81 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Alphabet Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, December 14th. Stockholders of record on Monday, December 7th will be given a dividend of $0.22 per share. This represents a $0.88 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.3%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, December 7th. Alphabet’s dividend payout ratio is currently 4.59%.

Insider Activity

In other news, Director Frances Arnold sold 83 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, September 30th. The shares were sold at an average price of $340.45, for a total transaction of $28,257.35. Following the completion of the sale, the director owned 19,076 shares in the company, valued at $6,494,424.20. This trade represents a 0.43% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. In the last ninety days, insiders have sold 247 shares of company stock worth $79,238. Company insiders own 11.61% of the company’s stock.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Alphabet

Several institutional investors and hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the company. State Street Corp lifted its holdings in Alphabet by 1.4% during the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 242,259,020 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $83,356,484,000 after purchasing an additional 3,281,761 shares during the last quarter. Fisher Asset Management LLC raised its position in shares of Alphabet by 1.7% in the third quarter. Fisher Asset Management LLC now owns 40,659,406 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $13,990,089,000 after purchasing an additional 669,566 shares during the period. Amundi raised its position in shares of Alphabet by 4.6% in the second quarter. Amundi now owns 33,203,350 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $11,865,809,000 after purchasing an additional 1,457,371 shares during the period. Mitsubishi UFJ Asset Management Co. Ltd. raised its position in shares of Alphabet by 10.1% in the second quarter. Mitsubishi UFJ Asset Management Co. Ltd. now owns 17,724,321 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $6,334,186,000 after purchasing an additional 1,631,721 shares during the period. Finally, Swiss National Bank lifted its stake in shares of Alphabet by 7.1% during the 1st quarter. Swiss National Bank now owns 17,079,800 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $4,911,467,000 after buying an additional 1,139,400 shares in the last quarter. 40.03% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Alphabet Company Profile

Alphabet Inc. is a technology holding company whose largest business is Google. Founded in 1998 by Larry Page and Sergey Brin, Google became part of Alphabet when the company reorganized its businesses under the holding-company structure in 2015. Google’s products and services include Search, YouTube, Android, Chrome, Google Maps, Google Play and Google Cloud. The company also generates revenue from digital advertising and offers devices, subscriptions and artificial intelligence products and services.