Focus Partners Wealth Raises Position in Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL)

Focus Partners Wealth lifted its stake in shares of Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) by 30.0% during the 4th quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The institutional investor owned 1,915,204 shares of the information services provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 441,504 shares during the period. Alphabet makes up 1.1% of Focus Partners Wealth’s holdings, making the stock its 19th biggest holding. Focus Partners Wealth’s holdings in Alphabet were worth $398,424,000 as of its most recent filing with the SEC.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently bought and sold shares of GOOGL. Compass Planning Associates Inc acquired a new position in shares of Alphabet in the fourth quarter worth about $30,000. E Fund Management Hong Kong Co. Ltd. increased its holdings in Alphabet by 518.8% during the 4th quarter. E Fund Management Hong Kong Co. Ltd. now owns 198 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $37,000 after purchasing an additional 166 shares during the last quarter. Fiduciary Advisors Inc. acquired a new position in shares of Alphabet in the 4th quarter valued at approximately $39,000. PayPay Securities Corp boosted its stake in shares of Alphabet by 36.1% during the 4th quarter. PayPay Securities Corp now owns 245 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $46,000 after buying an additional 65 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Anderson Financial Strategies LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Alphabet during the fourth quarter worth approximately $49,000. 40.03% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Insider Activity at Alphabet

In other news, Director Kavitark Ram Shriram sold 29,066 shares of Alphabet stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, February 18th. The stock was sold at an average price of $184.89, for a total value of $5,374,012.74. Following the transaction, the director now directly owns 272,466 shares in the company, valued at approximately $50,376,238.74. The trade was a 9.64 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, CAO Amie Thuener O’toole sold 2,824 shares of Alphabet stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, February 18th. The stock was sold at an average price of $187.43, for a total value of $529,302.32. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 15,024 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,815,948.32. This represents a 15.82 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last quarter, insiders sold 179,324 shares of company stock valued at $30,153,353. 11.64% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Alphabet Trading Down 1.0 %

Shares of NASDAQ GOOGL opened at $152.75 on Friday. The firm has a market capitalization of $1.85 trillion, a PE ratio of 18.98, a PEG ratio of 1.34 and a beta of 1.01. Alphabet Inc. has a one year low of $140.53 and a one year high of $207.05. The company has a current ratio of 1.84, a quick ratio of 1.84 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.03. The business has a 50-day moving average price of $158.93 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $175.10.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) last released its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, April 24th. The information services provider reported $2.81 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.02 by $0.79. Alphabet had a net margin of 28.60% and a return on equity of 32.49%. The firm had revenue of $76.49 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $89.30 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business earned $1.89 EPS. As a group, analysts predict that Alphabet Inc. will post 8.9 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Alphabet Increases Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, June 16th. Stockholders of record on Monday, June 9th will be paid a dividend of $0.21 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, June 9th. This is an increase from Alphabet’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.20. This represents a $0.84 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.55%. Alphabet’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 9.36%.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of research firms have commented on GOOGL. Oppenheimer increased their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $185.00 to $200.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Friday, April 25th. Tigress Financial upped their price objective on Alphabet from $220.00 to $240.00 and gave the company a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, April 30th. Rosenblatt Securities decreased their target price on Alphabet from $205.00 to $189.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, April 25th. Bank of America raised their price objective on Alphabet from $185.00 to $200.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, April 25th. Finally, Piper Sandler boosted their target price on shares of Alphabet from $185.00 to $195.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Friday, April 25th. Ten investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-six have given a buy rating and four have assigned a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $199.75.

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.