Mawer Investment Management Ltd. Cuts Position in Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG)

Mawer Investment Management Ltd. reduced its holdings in shares of Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) by 1.9% in the 2nd quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 6,040,293 shares of the information services provider’s stock after selling 114,448 shares during the quarter. Alphabet makes up approximately 5.2% of Mawer Investment Management Ltd.’s holdings, making the stock its 5th biggest position. Mawer Investment Management Ltd.’s holdings in Alphabet were worth $1,107,911,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently made changes to their positions in GOOG. Richardson Financial Services Inc. acquired a new stake in Alphabet in the 4th quarter valued at $34,000. 1620 Investment Advisors Inc. bought a new position in shares of Alphabet in the 2nd quarter valued at about $37,000. Slocum Gordon & Co LLP acquired a new stake in shares of Alphabet in the second quarter valued at about $44,000. Hoese & Co LLP raised its holdings in Alphabet by 62.5% during the second quarter. Hoese & Co LLP now owns 260 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $45,000 after acquiring an additional 100 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Iron Horse Wealth Management LLC acquired a new position in Alphabet during the second quarter valued at approximately $48,000. 27.26% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of equities research analysts have recently issued reports on the company. DA Davidson upgraded Alphabet to a “hold” rating in a research note on Tuesday. Oppenheimer increased their price target on shares of Alphabet from $205.00 to $210.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, July 24th. Wolfe Research raised shares of Alphabet to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, July 16th. Rosenblatt Securities cut shares of Alphabet from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $181.00 target price on the stock. in a report on Friday, June 28th. Finally, Cantor Fitzgerald upgraded Alphabet to a “hold” rating in a report on Thursday, September 5th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, six have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Alphabet presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $182.86.

Alphabet Stock Up 2.2 %

Shares of GOOG opened at $155.54 on Friday. The firm’s 50-day simple moving average is $169.73 and its 200 day simple moving average is $165.83. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.04, a quick ratio of 2.08 and a current ratio of 2.08. The firm has a market cap of $1.92 trillion, a P/E ratio of 23.86, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.13 and a beta of 1.04. Alphabet Inc. has a 52 week low of $121.46 and a 52 week high of $193.31.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOG) last posted its earnings results on Tuesday, July 23rd. The information services provider reported $1.89 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.85 by $0.04. The company had revenue of $84.74 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $84.22 billion. Alphabet had a return on equity of 30.49% and a net margin of 26.70%. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 13.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business earned $1.44 earnings per share. On average, analysts forecast that Alphabet Inc. will post 7.63 earnings per share for the current year.

Alphabet Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, September 16th. Stockholders of record on Monday, September 9th will be issued a dividend of $0.20 per share. This represents a $0.80 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.51%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, September 9th. Alphabet’s dividend payout ratio is currently 12.27%.

Insider Transactions at Alphabet

In related news, CAO Amie Thuener O’toole sold 2,835 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, September 10th. The shares were sold at an average price of $151.53, for a total transaction of $429,587.55. Following the transaction, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 29,182 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $4,421,948.46. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. In other news, SVP Prabhakar Raghavan sold 34,257 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, August 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $162.60, for a total transaction of $5,570,188.20. Following the completion of the sale, the senior vice president now directly owns 312,210 shares in the company, valued at approximately $50,765,346. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, CAO Amie Thuener O’toole sold 2,835 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, September 10th. The stock was sold at an average price of $151.53, for a total value of $429,587.55. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief accounting officer now owns 29,182 shares in the company, valued at approximately $4,421,948.46. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last 90 days, insiders sold 201,867 shares of company stock valued at $34,218,581. 12.99% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Alphabet Profile

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.