Alphabet Inc. $GOOGL Stock Holdings Lifted by Empirical Finance LLC

Empirical Finance LLC boosted its stake in Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) by 1.2% in the second quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The institutional investor owned 206,390 shares of the information services provider’s stock after buying an additional 2,468 shares during the quarter. Alphabet accounts for approximately 1.9% of Empirical Finance LLC’s portfolio, making the stock its 7th biggest position. Empirical Finance LLC’s holdings in Alphabet were worth $36,372,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other hedge funds have also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Nuveen LLC purchased a new stake in Alphabet in the 1st quarter valued at about $4,317,606,000. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 2.9% in the first quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 509,826,331 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $78,839,544,000 after acquiring an additional 14,307,345 shares in the last quarter. UBS AM A Distinct Business Unit of UBS Asset Management Americas LLC increased its position in shares of Alphabet by 11.4% during the first quarter. UBS AM A Distinct Business Unit of UBS Asset Management Americas LLC now owns 43,865,520 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $6,783,364,000 after acquiring an additional 4,473,901 shares during the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC lifted its holdings in Alphabet by 3.1% during the second quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 141,615,284 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $24,857,017,000 after acquiring an additional 4,224,497 shares during the period. Finally, Amundi lifted its holdings in Alphabet by 11.8% during the first quarter. Amundi now owns 33,403,871 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $5,034,992,000 after acquiring an additional 3,537,173 shares during the period. 40.03% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several brokerages have recently issued reports on GOOGL. Needham & Company LLC raised their target price on Alphabet from $260.00 to $330.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, October 30th. BNP Paribas started coverage on shares of Alphabet in a report on Monday, November 24th. They set an “outperform” rating and a $355.00 price objective for the company. Jefferies Financial Group boosted their target price on shares of Alphabet from $285.00 to $320.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 30th. Evercore ISI increased their target price on shares of Alphabet from $300.00 to $325.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Thursday, October 30th. Finally, Citic Securities lifted their price target on shares of Alphabet from $230.00 to $310.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Monday, November 3rd. Four analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, forty-one have assigned a Buy rating and six have given a Hold rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, Alphabet has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $307.84.

Alphabet Stock Up 0.0%

Shares of NASDAQ:GOOGL opened at $320.02 on Monday. The company has a market cap of $3.86 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 31.56, a PEG ratio of 1.86 and a beta of 1.05. Alphabet Inc. has a one year low of $140.53 and a one year high of $328.83. The firm has a fifty day moving average price of $269.25 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $219.56. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.07, a current ratio of 1.90 and a quick ratio of 1.90.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, October 29th. The information services provider reported $2.87 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.29 by $0.58. The company had revenue of $102.35 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $99.90 billion. Alphabet had a return on equity of 36.08% and a net margin of 32.23%. Analysts anticipate that Alphabet Inc. will post 8.9 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Alphabet Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, December 15th. Investors of record on Monday, December 8th will be paid a $0.21 dividend. This represents a $0.84 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.3%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, December 8th. Alphabet’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 8.28%.

Insider Activity at Alphabet

In other news, CEO Sundar Pichai sold 32,500 shares of the stock in a transaction on Wednesday, November 19th. The shares were sold at an average price of $296.64, for a total value of $9,640,800.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer owned 2,304,619 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $683,642,180.16. This represents a 1.39% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. Also, Director Frances Arnold sold 112 shares of Alphabet stock in a transaction on Thursday, October 30th. The stock was sold at an average price of $291.80, for a total transaction of $32,681.60. Following the sale, the director directly owned 18,004 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $5,253,567.20. This represents a 0.62% decrease in their ownership of the stock. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. In the last ninety days, insiders have sold 225,072 shares of company stock valued at $58,074,027. Company insiders own 11.64% of the company’s stock.

Alphabet 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.