Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) Stock Price Up 0.5% – Still a Buy?

Shares of Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) were up 0.5% on Thursday . The stock traded as high as $185.05 and last traded at $184.58. Approximately 5,241,424 shares traded hands during trading, a decline of 81% from the average daily volume of 27,319,570 shares. The stock had previously closed at $183.61.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several research firms have weighed in on GOOGL. Cantor Fitzgerald dropped their price objective on Alphabet from $215.00 to $210.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, January 22nd. Wolfe Research increased their price objective on Alphabet from $220.00 to $230.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Friday, January 3rd. JPMorgan Chase & Co. dropped their price objective on Alphabet from $232.00 to $220.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, February 5th. KeyCorp increased their target price on Alphabet from $215.00 to $225.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Friday, January 10th. Finally, Phillip Securities raised Alphabet to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Friday, November 1st. Ten analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-nine have issued a buy rating and four have assigned a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $210.62.

Alphabet Stock Down 0.5 %

The company has a 50-day moving average price of $192.85 and a 200 day moving average price of $175.14. The firm has a market capitalization of $2.27 trillion, a PE ratio of 23.01, a P/E/G ratio of 1.39 and a beta of 0.99. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.03, a current ratio of 1.84 and a quick ratio of 1.95.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, February 4th. The information services provider reported $2.15 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.12 by $0.03. Alphabet had a return on equity of 32.49% and a net margin of 28.60%. Analysts forecast that Alphabet Inc. will post 8.91 earnings per share for the current year.

Alphabet Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, March 17th. Stockholders of record on Monday, March 10th will be issued a $0.20 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Monday, March 10th. This represents a $0.80 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.43%. Alphabet’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 9.94%.

Insider Transactions at Alphabet

In other Alphabet news, CEO Sundar Pichai sold 22,500 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, November 20th. The stock was sold at an average price of $176.67, for a total transaction of $3,975,075.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 2,061,806 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $364,259,266.02. The trade was a 1.08 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Also, CAO Amie Thuener O’toole sold 1,367 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, December 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $170.41, for a total value of $232,950.47. Following the sale, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 23,515 shares in the company, valued at $4,007,191.15. The trade was a 5.49 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last three months, insiders have sold 89,529 shares of company stock valued at $16,600,078. 11.55% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several large investors have recently modified their holdings of GOOGL. FMR LLC boosted its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 9.8% in the fourth quarter. FMR LLC now owns 248,416,916 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $47,025,322,000 after purchasing an additional 22,100,902 shares during the period. State Street Corp boosted its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 0.3% in the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 222,555,548 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $36,910,838,000 after purchasing an additional 743,369 shares during the period. Geode Capital Management LLC boosted its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 2.0% in the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 134,030,679 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $22,154,651,000 after purchasing an additional 2,626,431 shares during the period. Norges Bank purchased a new stake in shares of Alphabet in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $24,383,677,000. Finally, Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD lifted its holdings in Alphabet by 8.3% during the fourth quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 98,638,127 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $18,672,198,000 after buying an additional 7,574,417 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 40.03% of the company’s stock.

About Alphabet

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.