Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOG) Trading Up 0.4% on Analyst Upgrade

Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) shares rose 0.4% during mid-day trading on Friday after Scotiabank raised their price target on the stock from $212.00 to $240.00. Scotiabank currently has a sector outperform rating on the stock. Alphabet traded as high as $201.93 and last traded at $200.35. Approximately 3,501,939 shares were traded during trading, a decline of 77% from the average daily volume of 15,318,407 shares. The stock had previously closed at $199.58.

Other equities research analysts have also recently issued research reports about the company. Oppenheimer boosted their price target on Alphabet from $185.00 to $215.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. UBS Group boosted their target price on shares of Alphabet from $187.00 to $192.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $208.00 to $212.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. Citigroup increased their target price on shares of Alphabet from $212.00 to $216.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Finally, Canaccord Genuity Group boosted their price target on Alphabet from $220.00 to $225.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Six research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twelve have issued a buy rating and three have assigned a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $205.13.

Insider Transactions at Alphabet

In other news, CAO Amie Thuener O’toole sold 1,367 shares of Alphabet stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, November 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $171.42, for a total transaction of $234,331.14. Following the sale, the chief accounting officer now owns 26,349 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $4,516,745.58. This trade represents a 4.93 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, insider John Kent Walker sold 16,820 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Monday, December 30th. The shares were sold at an average price of $192.62, for a total value of $3,239,868.40. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now owns 43,981 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $8,471,620.22. The trade was a 27.66 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last 90 days, insiders have sold 133,387 shares of company stock worth $24,368,654. 12.99% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Alphabet

Several institutional investors and hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of GOOG. FMR LLC boosted its position in shares of Alphabet by 5.2% during the 3rd quarter. FMR LLC now owns 114,802,133 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $19,193,768,000 after acquiring an additional 5,655,022 shares in the last quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC lifted its stake in Alphabet by 10.3% during the third quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC now owns 33,334,082 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $5,573,125,000 after purchasing an additional 3,113,395 shares during the period. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. boosted its holdings in Alphabet by 65.9% during the third quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 6,294,332 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $1,052,349,000 after purchasing an additional 2,500,621 shares in the last quarter. Healthcare of Ontario Pension Plan Trust Fund boosted its holdings in Alphabet by 182.1% during the third quarter. Healthcare of Ontario Pension Plan Trust Fund now owns 2,526,055 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $422,331,000 after purchasing an additional 1,630,701 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Jennison Associates LLC grew its stake in shares of Alphabet by 9.1% in the 3rd quarter. Jennison Associates LLC now owns 15,424,324 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $2,578,793,000 after purchasing an additional 1,291,274 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 27.26% of the company’s stock.

Alphabet Stock Performance

The company has a current ratio of 1.95, a quick ratio of 1.95 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.04. The firm has a market capitalization of $2.47 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 26.78, a PEG ratio of 1.27 and a beta of 0.99. The stock has a fifty day moving average price of $187.95 and a 200-day moving average price of $175.31.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOG) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 29th. The information services provider reported $2.12 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.83 by $0.29. Alphabet had a return on equity of 31.66% and a net margin of 27.74%. The firm had revenue of $88.27 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $86.39 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the company posted $1.55 earnings per share. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 15.1% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, analysts anticipate that Alphabet Inc. will post 8.02 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Alphabet Dividend Announcement

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, December 16th. Investors of record on Monday, December 9th were issued a dividend of $0.20 per share. This represents a $0.80 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.40%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, December 9th. Alphabet’s dividend payout ratio is currently 10.61%.

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.