Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) Given Average Rating of “Moderate Buy” by Analysts

Shares of Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) have received a consensus recommendation of “Moderate Buy” from the fifty-four brokerages that are presently covering the company, Marketbeat Ratings reports. Five equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, forty-seven have issued a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the company. The average 12 month price target among brokers that have covered the stock in the last year is $413.1329.

GOOGL has been the subject of several recent analyst reports. BMO Capital Markets lifted their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $410.00 to $435.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, April 30th. Barclays reaffirmed a “buy” rating on shares of Alphabet in a research note on Friday, May 29th. Canaccord Genuity Group lifted their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $415.00 to $450.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, April 30th. Stifel Nicolaus set a $420.00 price objective on shares of Alphabet and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, April 30th. Finally, Arete Research lifted their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $405.00 to $425.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Monday, May 18th.

Alphabet Trading Up 0.5%

GOOGL stock opened at $359.68 on Friday. The firm has a fifty day moving average price of $360.45 and a 200 day moving average price of $330.26. Alphabet has a fifty-two week low of $162.00 and a fifty-two week high of $408.61. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.16, a quick ratio of 1.92 and a current ratio of 1.92. The firm has a market cap of $4.36 trillion, a PE ratio of 27.44, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.54 and a beta of 1.23.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, April 29th. The information services provider reported $5.11 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.64 by $2.47. The firm had revenue of $109.90 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $106.98 billion. Alphabet had a net margin of 37.92% and a return on equity of 38.99%. Sell-side analysts anticipate that Alphabet will post 14.3 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Alphabet Increases Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, June 15th. Shareholders of record on Monday, June 8th will be paid a dividend of $0.22 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, June 8th. This is a positive change from Alphabet’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.21. This represents a $0.88 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.2%. Alphabet’s payout ratio is presently 6.71%.

Insider Activity at Alphabet

In other Alphabet news, Director John L. Hennessy sold 1,050 shares of Alphabet stock in a transaction on Friday, May 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $393.26, for a total transaction of $412,923.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director directly owned 2,531 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $995,341.06. The trade was a 29.32% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, CEO Sundar Pichai sold 32,500 shares of Alphabet stock in a transaction on Wednesday, March 18th. The stock was sold at an average price of $307.89, for a total transaction of $10,006,425.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer directly owned 1,642,060 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $505,573,853.40. The trade was a 1.94% decrease in their ownership of the stock. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. Insiders sold 193,016 shares of company stock valued at $17,282,549 over the last three months. Corporate insiders own 11.61% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of Alphabet

A number of large investors have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Strategic Wealth Advisors LLC boosted 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 valued at $137,000 after purchasing an additional 27 shares during the period. Rockbridge Investment Management LCC boosted its stake in shares of Alphabet by 0.5% during the first quarter. Rockbridge Investment Management LCC now owns 5,460 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $1,570,000 after purchasing an additional 27 shares during the period. Ruggaard & Associates LLC boosted its stake in shares of Alphabet by 0.9% during the first quarter. Ruggaard & Associates LLC now owns 2,921 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $840,000 after purchasing an additional 27 shares during the period. Cadia Private Client LLC boosted its stake in shares of Alphabet by 1.1% during the first quarter. Cadia Private Client LLC now owns 2,589 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $744,000 after purchasing an additional 28 shares during the period. Finally, Evansbrook LLC boosted its stake in shares of Alphabet by 0.3% during the first quarter. Evansbrook LLC now owns 9,522 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $2,738,000 after purchasing an additional 28 shares during the period. 40.03% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Key Alphabet News

Here are the key news stories impacting Alphabet this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Alphabet’s drone unit Wing expanded its Walmart partnership into seven more U.S. cities, pushing the service toward nearly 20 markets and signaling that drone delivery is moving from experiment to scalable business. Alphabet’s Most Overlooked Division Just Had a Big Week
• Positive Sentiment: Waymo launched a new $29.99 monthly membership program with perks for frequent riders, a move that suggests the robotaxi business is building recurring revenue on top of rapid ride-growth. Waymo launches premier subscription tier for $29.99 a month, starting in select cities
• Positive Sentiment: TD Cowen raised its price target on Alphabet, adding to the bullish analyst backdrop and supporting the view that the stock still has room to run. Alphabet (GOOGL) Among Our Good Stocks to Buy Now
• Positive Sentiment: Bank of America and other commentary highlighted Alphabet as a long-term AI beneficiary, especially as rising model costs could strengthen demand for Google Cloud and infrastructure. Anthropic’s Priciest AI Model Yet Is Here. Why Alphabet and Amazon Will Benefit.
• Neutral Sentiment: Alphabet sued an alleged Chinese cybercrime group accused of using Google’s AI tools to run scam operations, which shows the company is actively defending its platform but is not likely to move the stock much on its own. Google sues alleged Chinese cybercrime operation that used AI to send scam texts
• Neutral Sentiment: Some investors noted that Altimeter Capital fully exited its Alphabet stake in Q1, but this appears more like portfolio repositioning than a company-specific warning. Billionaire Brad Gerstner Dumped All of His Alphabet Then Bought 2 Stocks Nobody Expected

About Alphabet

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.