Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOG) Rating Lowered to “Hold” at Citizens Jmp

Citizens Jmp cut shares of Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGFree Report) from a strong-buy rating to a hold rating in a report released on Thursday,Zacks.com reports.

A number of other equities analysts also recently commented on the stock. Oppenheimer increased their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $185.00 to $215.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. Citigroup raised their price target 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. Phillip Securities upgraded Alphabet to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Friday, November 1st. UBS Group raised their target price on shares of Alphabet from $187.00 to $192.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted their target price on shares of Alphabet from $208.00 to $212.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Six research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, thirteen have issued a buy rating and three have given a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $200.56.

Read Our Latest Report on GOOG

Alphabet Stock Performance

GOOG stock opened at $193.13 on Thursday. Alphabet has a 1-year low of $131.55 and a 1-year high of $202.88. The business’s 50-day moving average price is $181.77 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $174.00. The firm has a market cap of $2.36 trillion, a PE ratio of 25.61, a P/E/G ratio of 1.34 and a beta of 0.99. The company has a current ratio of 1.95, a quick ratio of 1.95 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.04.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGGet Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 29th. The information services provider reported $2.12 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating 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 business had revenue of $88.27 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $86.39 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $1.55 EPS. Alphabet’s quarterly revenue was up 15.1% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, research analysts forecast that Alphabet will post 8.02 earnings per share for the current year.

Alphabet Announces Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, December 16th. Stockholders of record on Monday, December 9th were issued a dividend of $0.20 per share. This represents a $0.80 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.41%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, December 9th. Alphabet’s payout ratio is 10.61%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Alphabet

In other Alphabet news, CAO Amie Thuener O’toole sold 2,834 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, October 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $167.23, for a total transaction of $473,929.82. Following the completion of the sale, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 26,349 shares in the company, valued at $4,406,343.27. This represents a 9.71 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, Director John L. Hennessy sold 1,500 shares of Alphabet stock in a transaction dated Monday, October 14th. The stock was sold at an average price of $164.95, for a total value of $247,425.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director now owns 26,324 shares in the company, valued at approximately $4,342,143.80. This represents a 5.39 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 155,887 shares of company stock worth $27,996,356 over the last three months. 12.99% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Alphabet

Large investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. M&G PLC purchased a new position in Alphabet during the 3rd quarter valued at about $2,240,000. Coldstream Capital Management Inc. raised its holdings in Alphabet by 14.4% in the 3rd quarter. Coldstream Capital Management Inc. now owns 116,776 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $19,642,000 after acquiring an additional 14,738 shares during the last quarter. Metis Global Partners LLC lifted its position in Alphabet by 1.4% in the 3rd quarter. Metis Global Partners LLC now owns 301,980 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $50,488,000 after acquiring an additional 4,292 shares in the last quarter. Stevens Capital Management LP boosted its stake in Alphabet by 172.9% during the 3rd quarter. Stevens Capital Management LP now owns 91,237 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $15,254,000 after purchasing an additional 57,810 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Verdence Capital Advisors LLC increased its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 10.2% in the 3rd quarter. Verdence Capital Advisors LLC now owns 63,545 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $10,624,000 after purchasing an additional 5,892 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 27.26% of the company’s stock.

About Alphabet

(Get Free Report)

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.

See Also

Analyst Recommendations for Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOG)

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