Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) Receives $205.90 Average Target Price from Analysts

Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) has been assigned an average rating of “Moderate Buy” from the forty-two analysts that are covering the stock, Marketbeat.com reports. Seven analysts have rated the stock with a hold recommendation, thirty-one have issued a buy recommendation and four have issued a strong buy recommendation on the company. The average 12-month target price among brokerages that have covered the stock in the last year is $205.90.

GOOGL has been the subject of several research analyst reports. Morgan Stanley lifted their price objective on Alphabet from $190.00 to $205.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. JMP Securities lifted their target price on Alphabet from $200.00 to $220.00 and gave the company a “market outperform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their target price on Alphabet from $182.00 to $187.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Truist Financial lifted 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. Finally, Scotiabank upgraded Alphabet to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Friday, October 11th.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Alphabet news, insider John Kent Walker sold 21,467 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, September 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $160.35, for a total transaction of $3,442,233.45. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now owns 39,334 shares in the company, valued at $6,307,206.90. This represents a 35.31 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Also, CAO Amie Thuener O’toole sold 682 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, September 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $160.44, for a total value of $109,420.08. Following the sale, the chief accounting officer now owns 32,017 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $5,136,807.48. This represents a 2.09 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 206,795 shares of company stock valued at $34,673,866 over the last quarter. 11.55% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Trading of Alphabet

A number of hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the stock. International Assets Investment Management LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 43,005.6% during the 3rd quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC now owns 18,743,594 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $31,086,250,000 after purchasing an additional 18,700,111 shares during the last quarter. SG Americas Securities LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 587.4% during the 3rd quarter. SG Americas Securities LLC now owns 10,690,326 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $1,772,991,000 after purchasing an additional 9,135,056 shares during the last quarter. Capital Research Global Investors lifted its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 14.4% during the 1st quarter. Capital Research Global Investors now owns 57,803,291 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $8,724,251,000 after purchasing an additional 7,275,757 shares during the last quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. lifted its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 116.4% during the 3rd quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 8,670,225 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $1,437,957,000 after purchasing an additional 4,662,809 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Wulff Hansen & CO. lifted its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 18,810.2% during the 2nd quarter. Wulff Hansen & CO. now owns 4,434,260 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $807,700,000 after purchasing an additional 4,410,811 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 40.03% of the company’s stock.

Alphabet Stock Performance

Shares of GOOGL opened at $164.76 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.04, a current ratio of 1.95 and a quick ratio of 1.95. Alphabet has a one year low of $127.90 and a one year high of $191.75. The firm has a market capitalization of $2.02 trillion, a P/E ratio of 21.85, a PEG ratio of 1.27 and a beta of 1.03. The business has a fifty day moving average of $167.64 and a 200 day moving average of $170.36.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 29th. The information services provider reported $2.12 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.83 by $0.29. Alphabet had a return on equity of 31.66% and a net margin of 27.74%. The company had revenue of $88.27 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $72.85 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $1.55 earnings per share. As a group, sell-side analysts anticipate that Alphabet will post 7.99 EPS for the current year.

Alphabet Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, December 16th. Investors of record on Monday, December 9th will be paid a $0.20 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, December 9th. This represents a $0.80 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.49%. Alphabet’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) 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.