Welch Financial Planning LLC Invests $867,000 in Alphabet Inc. $GOOG

Welch Financial Planning LLC bought a new position in shares of Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) in the 4th quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm bought 2,763 shares of the information services provider’s stock, valued at approximately $867,000. Alphabet comprises approximately 0.6% of Welch Financial Planning LLC’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 29th biggest holding.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also made changes to their positions in GOOG. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its position in shares of Alphabet by 2.0% during the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 421,013,782 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $132,114,125,000 after purchasing an additional 8,128,234 shares during the last quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted its position in shares of Alphabet by 8.6% during the third quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 99,529,742 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $24,240,469,000 after purchasing an additional 7,904,434 shares during the last quarter. Danske Bank A S bought a new stake in shares of Alphabet during the third quarter worth $678,198,000. PFA Pension Forsikringsaktieselskab bought a new stake in shares of Alphabet during the fourth quarter worth $869,781,000. Finally, Holocene Advisors LP purchased a new position in shares of Alphabet during the second quarter valued at $455,745,000. 27.26% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Insider Activity at Alphabet

In related news, CAO Amie Thuener O’toole sold 617 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, April 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $289.63, for a total transaction of $178,701.71. Following the sale, the chief accounting officer owned 10,093 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,923,235.59. This trade represents a 5.76% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, Director Frances Arnold sold 102 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, April 30th. The shares were sold at an average price of $371.00, for a total value of $37,842.00. Following the sale, the director directly owned 18,621 shares in the company, valued at approximately $6,908,391. The trade was a 0.54% decrease in their position. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. Insiders have sold 157,953 shares of company stock valued at $47,767,818 over the last 90 days. Company insiders own 12.99% of the company’s stock.

Key Headlines Impacting Alphabet

Here are the key news stories impacting Alphabet this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Alphabet’s AI and cloud businesses are being cited as key growth drivers, with reports emphasizing strong revenue growth, improving cloud margins, and a large backlog supporting future expansion.
• Positive Sentiment: New product and platform launches, including Googlebook laptops and broader Gemini AI integrations, are reinforcing the view that Alphabet can monetize AI across both software and hardware.
• Positive Sentiment: Analyst and investor commentary remains upbeat, with multiple bullish ratings, higher price targets, and articles arguing Alphabet still has room to run after its post-earnings surge. Article Title
• Positive Sentiment: Reports that Anthropic plans to spend heavily on Google infrastructure add to the narrative that Alphabet is becoming a central provider of AI compute capacity.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several research firms recently weighed in on GOOG. Freedom Capital downgraded Alphabet from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Monday, May 4th. Weiss Ratings restated a “buy (b)” rating on shares of Alphabet in a report on Monday, April 20th. Raymond James Financial restated a “strong-buy” rating and issued a $425.00 price objective on shares of Alphabet in a report on Thursday, April 30th. Oppenheimer restated an “outperform” rating and issued a $425.00 price objective on shares of Alphabet in a report on Thursday, April 30th. Finally, Pivotal Research restated a “buy” rating and issued a $470.00 price objective (up from $420.00) on shares of Alphabet in a report on Wednesday, April 29th. Six equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-eight have issued a Buy rating and four have issued a Hold rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has an average rating of “Buy” and an average price target of $362.73.

Alphabet Stock Performance

GOOG stock opened at $397.17 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.16, a current ratio of 1.92 and a quick ratio of 1.92. The business has a 50-day moving average price of $325.64 and a 200 day moving average price of $316.44. The company has a market capitalization of $4.81 trillion, a P/E ratio of 30.30, a PEG ratio of 1.71 and a beta of 1.25. Alphabet Inc. has a 1-year low of $163.33 and a 1-year high of $399.93.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOG) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, April 30th. The information services provider reported $5.11 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.68 by $2.43. Alphabet had a return on equity of 38.99% and a net margin of 37.92%.The company had revenue of $109.90 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $106.96 billion. During the same quarter last year, the company earned $2.81 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 21.8% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities research analysts forecast that Alphabet Inc. will post 14.28 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Alphabet Increases Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, June 15th. Investors of record on Monday, June 8th will be given a dividend of $0.22 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, June 8th. This is an increase from Alphabet’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.21. This represents a $0.88 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.2%. Alphabet’s dividend payout ratio is 6.41%.

Alphabet Company Profile

Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ: GOOG) is a multinational technology holding company headquartered in Mountain View, California. Formed in 2015 through a corporate restructuring of Google, Alphabet serves as the parent to Google LLC and a portfolio of businesses collectively known as “Other Bets.” Google was originally founded in 1998 by Larry Page and Sergey Brin; Alphabet is led by CEO Sundar Pichai, who oversees Google and the broader company while the founders remain prominent shareholders and influential figures in the company’s history.

Alphabet’s core business centers on internet search and advertising, with Google Search and the company’s ad platforms (including Google Ads and AdSense) generating the majority of revenue by connecting advertisers with consumers worldwide.