Kellett Wealth Advisors LLC Grows Position in Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG)

Kellett Wealth Advisors LLC grew its stake in Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) by 9.9% during the 1st quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The fund owned 2,621 shares of the information services provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 236 shares during the period. Kellett Wealth Advisors LLC’s holdings in Alphabet were worth $409,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Other large investors have also made changes to their positions in the company. LaFleur & Godfrey LLC raised its holdings in Alphabet by 1.2% in the 4th quarter. LaFleur & Godfrey LLC now owns 31,967 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $6,088,000 after acquiring an additional 380 shares during the last quarter. Brighton Jones LLC grew its position in shares of Alphabet by 5.6% in the fourth quarter. Brighton Jones LLC now owns 120,253 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $22,901,000 after purchasing an additional 6,410 shares during the period. Union Bancaire Privee UBP SA acquired a new position in Alphabet in the fourth quarter valued at $204,262,000. Ascent Wealth Partners LLC lifted its position in Alphabet by 246.2% during the fourth quarter. Ascent Wealth Partners LLC now owns 5,698 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $1,085,000 after buying an additional 4,052 shares during the period. Finally, Bank Pictet & Cie Europe AG boosted its stake in Alphabet by 4.3% in the 4th quarter. Bank Pictet & Cie Europe AG now owns 506,535 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $96,465,000 after buying an additional 20,855 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 27.26% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of research analysts have recently commented on GOOG shares. Citigroup reaffirmed a “sell” rating on shares of Alphabet in a research note on Wednesday, April 23rd. Needham & Company LLC lowered shares of Alphabet from a “buy” rating to a “cautious” rating in a research report on Friday, May 2nd. KeyCorp cut their price target on shares of Alphabet from $202.00 to $185.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, April 9th. Susquehanna reissued a “positive” rating on shares of Alphabet in a research note on Friday, May 2nd. Finally, UBS Group dropped their price objective on Alphabet from $209.00 to $173.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a report on Friday, April 11th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, five have assigned a hold rating, fourteen have issued a buy rating and five have given a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $204.88.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Alphabet news, CAO Amie Thuener O’toole sold 673 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, April 1st. The shares were sold at an average price of $155.33, for a total transaction of $104,537.09. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 15,303 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,377,014.99. This trade represents a 4.21% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Also, CEO Sundar Pichai sold 32,500 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, April 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $158.56, for a total transaction of $5,153,200.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 2,717,696 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $430,917,877.76. The trade was a 1.18% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 216,306 shares of company stock worth $35,782,927 in the last three months. 12.99% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Alphabet Stock Performance

Alphabet stock opened at $171.49 on Thursday. Alphabet Inc. has a 12-month low of $142.66 and a 12-month high of $208.70. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.03, a current ratio of 1.77 and a quick ratio of 1.77. The company has a market capitalization of $2.08 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 19.12, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.18 and a beta of 1.01. The firm’s fifty day moving average price is $166.90 and its 200 day moving average price is $176.24.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOG) last announced its earnings results 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 return on equity of 34.54% and a net margin of 30.86%. The company had revenue of $90.23 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $89.30 billion. During the same period last year, the firm earned $1.89 earnings per share. The company’s revenue was up 12.0% on a year-over-year basis. On average, research analysts forecast that Alphabet Inc. will post 8.89 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Alphabet Increases Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, June 16th. Shareholders of record on Monday, June 9th were issued a dividend of $0.21 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, June 9th. This is an increase from Alphabet’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.20. This represents a $0.84 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.49%. Alphabet’s payout ratio is currently 9.36%.

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.