Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) Trading Up 2.3% – What’s Next?

Shares of Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) shot up 2.3% during mid-day trading on Wednesday . The company traded as high as $194.77 and last traded at $194.07. 5,766,150 shares traded hands during trading, a decline of 73% from the average session volume of 21,218,010 shares. The stock had previously closed at $189.66.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of brokerages have recently weighed in on GOOGL. Scotiabank upgraded Alphabet to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Friday, October 11th. Citizens Jmp downgraded shares of Alphabet from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Thursday, January 2nd. BMO Capital Markets reissued an “outperform” rating and set a $217.00 price objective (up from $215.00) on shares of Alphabet in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. Bank of America restated a “buy” rating and set a $210.00 price objective on shares of Alphabet in a research report on Monday, December 23rd. Finally, Tigress Financial increased their target price on Alphabet from $210.00 to $220.00 and gave the company a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Thursday, September 26th. Nine investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, thirty have assigned a buy rating and four have issued a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Alphabet has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $208.15.

Alphabet Price Performance

The company has a market cap of $2.37 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 25.73, a P/E/G ratio of 1.35 and a beta of 0.98. The company’s 50-day simple moving average is $183.45 and its 200-day simple moving average is $173.04. 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 (NASDAQ:GOOGL) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 29th. The information services provider reported $2.12 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.83 by $0.29. The firm had revenue of $88.27 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $72.85 billion. Alphabet had a net margin of 27.74% and a return on equity of 31.66%. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business posted $1.55 EPS. On average, equities research analysts anticipate that Alphabet Inc. will post 8.01 EPS for the current year.

Alphabet Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, December 16th. Shareholders of record on Monday, December 9th were paid a dividend of $0.20 per share. The ex-dividend date was Monday, December 9th. This represents a $0.80 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.41%. Alphabet’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 10.61%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Alphabet news, CAO Amie Thuener O’toole sold 1,367 shares of Alphabet stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, November 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $171.42, for a total value of $234,331.14. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 26,349 shares in the company, valued at $4,516,745.58. The trade was a 4.93 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, Director Kavitark Ram Shriram sold 37,134 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, December 10th. The stock was sold at an average price of $185.02, for a total value of $6,870,532.68. Following the sale, the director now owns 282,832 shares in the company, valued at $52,329,576.64. The trade was a 11.61 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 130,553 shares of company stock worth $23,817,951 in the last three months. 11.55% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. International Assets Investment Management LLC raised its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 43,005.6% during the third 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 buying an additional 18,700,111 shares during the last quarter. SG Americas Securities LLC increased its position in Alphabet by 587.4% in 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 acquiring an additional 9,135,056 shares during the period. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. raised its stake in 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 acquiring an additional 4,662,809 shares in the last quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted its position in Alphabet by 7.7% during the 3rd quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 63,667,407 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $10,559,240,000 after acquiring an additional 4,567,275 shares during the period. Finally, Wulff Hansen & CO. grew its stake in shares of Alphabet by 18,810.2% in the second quarter. Wulff Hansen & CO. now owns 4,434,260 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $807,700,000 after purchasing an additional 4,410,811 shares in the last quarter. 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.