Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) Stock Rating Lowered by Freedom Capital

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) was downgraded by analysts at Freedom Capital from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a note issued to investors on Monday,Zacks.com reports.

Other equities research analysts have also issued reports about the company. Citigroup restated an “outperform” rating on shares of Alphabet in a report on Monday. Daiwa Securities Group increased their price target on Alphabet from $333.00 to $380.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, February 10th. Robert W. Baird raised their target price on Alphabet from $380.00 to $400.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Thursday, April 30th. President Capital lifted their price objective on Alphabet from $323.00 to $375.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, February 10th. Finally, Stifel Nicolaus set a $420.00 price objective on Alphabet and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, forty-seven have assigned a Buy rating and five have issued a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $402.96.

Alphabet Stock Performance

Shares of GOOGL stock opened at $383.25 on Monday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.16, a current ratio of 1.92 and a quick ratio of 1.92. Alphabet has a fifty-two week low of $147.84 and a fifty-two week high of $387.38. The stock’s 50-day moving average is $313.72 and its two-hundred day moving average is $308.70. The firm has a market cap of $4.64 trillion, a P/E ratio of 29.23, a PEG ratio of 1.80 and a beta of 1.26.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) last issued its earnings results on Wednesday, April 29th. The information services provider reported $5.11 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.64 by $2.47. Alphabet had a return on equity of 38.99% and a net margin of 37.92%.The company had revenue of $109.90 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $106.98 billion. Analysts predict that Alphabet will post 12.94 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, CAO Amie Thuener O’toole sold 617 shares of Alphabet stock in a transaction on Wednesday, April 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $289.63, for a total value of $178,701.71. Following the completion of the sale, the chief accounting officer directly owned 10,093 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,923,235.59. This trade represents a 5.76% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, insider John Kent Walker sold 8,993 shares of Alphabet stock in a transaction on Friday, March 27th. The shares were sold at an average price of $275.89, for a total value of $2,481,078.77. Following the completion of the sale, the insider directly owned 51,808 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $14,293,309.12. This trade represents a 14.79% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. In the last three months, insiders sold 191,053 shares of company stock worth $58,845,206. 11.64% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Alphabet

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the company. Strategic Wealth Advisors LLC grew its stake in shares of Alphabet by 6.0% during the first quarter. Strategic Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 477 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $137,000 after purchasing an additional 27 shares during the period. Symmetry Partners LLC grew its stake in shares of Alphabet by 0.4% during the fourth quarter. Symmetry Partners LLC now owns 7,912 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $2,476,000 after purchasing an additional 30 shares during the period. Private Wealth Management Group LLC grew its stake in shares of Alphabet by 1.2% during the first quarter. Private Wealth Management Group LLC now owns 2,540 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $730,000 after purchasing an additional 30 shares during the period. Members Trust Co grew its stake in shares of Alphabet by 0.5% during the fourth quarter. Members Trust Co now owns 6,434 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $2,014,000 after purchasing an additional 31 shares during the period. Finally, Altfest L J & Co. Inc. grew its stake in shares of Alphabet by 0.4% during the fourth quarter. Altfest L J & Co. Inc. now owns 7,952 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $2,489,000 after purchasing an additional 31 shares during the period. 40.03% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Trending Headlines about Alphabet

Here are the key news stories impacting Alphabet this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Multiple brokerages raised price targets and reaffirmed buy ratings (Citizens, New Street, China Renaissance, JPMorgan, Jefferies), signaling fresh analyst conviction and lifting demand for the stock. Analysts revise Google stock price target
• Positive Sentiment: Strong Q1 results and investor takeaways: Alphabet posted a sizable beat, highlighted accelerating Google Cloud backlog and AI-related revenue strength — catalysts that underpin near-term earnings upside and multiple re-rating. Alphabet Inc. 2026 Q1 – Results – Earnings Call Presentation
• Positive Sentiment: Google Cloud growth reportedly outpaced AWS and Azure, reinforcing the monetization narrative for cloud and AI infrastructure spend — a key longer-term revenue driver. Alphabet’s Google Cloud growth outpaces AWS and Azure
• Neutral Sentiment: Waymo continues to attract heavy funding (largest VC pushes into autonomous vehicles), which supports Alphabet’s long-term growth optionality but is capital-intensive and slower to monetize. Big money is betting the self-driving future belongs to a small club
• Neutral Sentiment: Industry-level dynamics: Google’s announced AI buildout is lifting demand for semiconductors and third-party suppliers (NVDA, TSM, AVGO), which is supportive for the AI ecosystem that benefits Alphabet indirectly. 3 Semiconductor Stocks Poised to Gain
• Neutral Sentiment: Supply/infrastructure risk: countries like Denmark are pausing new data-center hookups as grid constraints and local pushback rise — a potential headwind for capacity expansion plans. Denmark faces data center reckoning
• Negative Sentiment: UK DeepMind employees voted to unionize citing concerns over AI military contracts, creating reputational and potential operational headwinds that investors may view as governance risk. UK Google DeepMind employees vote to unionize
• Negative Sentiment: Technical sell signal: a trading commentator predicted a potential 45% crash based on chart patterns — a speculative call that can amplify volatility if traders act on it. Trading expert sets date when Google stock will crash
• Negative Sentiment: Insider activity: a director sold ~$38k of stock — a small amount but often flagged by markets as a near-term negative datapoint. Alphabet Director Sells Stock

Alphabet Company Profile

Alphabet Inc is the holding company created in 2015 to organize Google and a portfolio of businesses developing technologies beyond Google’s core internet services. Its principal operations are led by Google, which builds and operates consumer-facing products such as Google Search, YouTube, Android, Chrome, Gmail, Google Maps and Google Workspace, as well as advertising platforms (Google Ads and AdSense) that historically generate the majority of its revenue. Google also develops consumer hardware (Pixel phones, Nest smart-home devices, Chromecast) and developer and distribution platforms such as Google Play.

Beyond Google’s consumer and advertising businesses, Alphabet invests in enterprise and infrastructure offerings through Google Cloud, which provides cloud computing, data analytics and productivity services to businesses and institutions.