Woodard & Co. Asset Management Group Inc. ADV Purchases 166 Shares of Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL)

Woodard & Co. Asset Management Group Inc. ADV grew its stake in shares of Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) by 14.5% during the 3rd quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 1,308 shares of the information services provider’s stock after buying an additional 166 shares during the quarter. Woodard & Co. Asset Management Group Inc. ADV’s holdings in Alphabet were worth $217,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently made changes to their positions in GOOGL. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its position in Alphabet by 0.8% in the 1st quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 497,874,324 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $75,144,172,000 after purchasing an additional 4,064,073 shares during the period. Capital Research Global Investors raised its position in Alphabet by 14.4% in the 1st quarter. Capital Research Global Investors now owns 57,803,291 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $8,724,251,000 after purchasing an additional 7,275,757 shares during the period. Bank of New York Mellon Corp raised its position in Alphabet by 0.5% in the 2nd quarter. Bank of New York Mellon Corp now owns 49,472,478 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $9,011,412,000 after purchasing an additional 238,403 shares during the period. Capital World Investors raised its position in Alphabet by 1.7% in the 1st quarter. Capital World Investors now owns 35,412,299 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $5,344,778,000 after purchasing an additional 597,756 shares during the period. Finally, American Century Companies Inc. raised its position in Alphabet by 1.8% in the 2nd quarter. American Century Companies Inc. now owns 23,465,190 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $4,274,184,000 after purchasing an additional 418,204 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 40.03% of the company’s stock.

Alphabet Stock Performance

GOOGL opened at $169.74 on Wednesday. The firm has a market cap of $2.09 trillion, a P/E ratio of 22.51, a PEG ratio of 1.22 and a beta of 1.03. Alphabet Inc. has a 1-year low of $127.90 and a 1-year high of $191.75. The company has a 50 day simple moving average of $162.59 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $169.31. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.04, a current ratio of 1.95 and a quick ratio of 1.95.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) last issued its earnings results on Tuesday, October 29th. The information services provider reported $2.12 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.83 by $0.29. Alphabet had a net margin of 27.74% and a return on equity of 31.66%. The firm had revenue of $88.27 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $72.85 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business earned $1.55 earnings per share. Equities analysts forecast that Alphabet Inc. will post 7.99 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Alphabet Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, December 16th. Shareholders of record on Monday, December 9th will be given a dividend of $0.20 per share. The ex-dividend date is Monday, December 9th. This represents a $0.80 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.47%. Alphabet’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 10.61%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Alphabet

In other Alphabet news, SVP Prabhakar Raghavan sold 34,257 shares of the stock in a transaction on Thursday, August 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $162.60, for a total transaction of $5,570,188.20. Following the completion of the transaction, the senior vice president now owns 312,210 shares in the company, valued at $50,765,346. This trade represents a 0.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. 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 value of $429,587.55. Following the transaction, the chief accounting officer now owns 29,182 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $4,421,948.46. This trade represents a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, SVP Prabhakar Raghavan sold 34,257 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated 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 transaction, the senior vice president now directly owns 312,210 shares in the company, valued at $50,765,346. This represents a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 209,552 shares of company stock worth $34,433,848 over the last 90 days. 11.55% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of equities analysts recently commented on GOOGL shares. Tigress Financial lifted their target price on shares of Alphabet from $210.00 to $220.00 and gave the stock a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, September 26th. Wedbush restated an “outperform” rating and issued a $205.00 price objective on shares of Alphabet in a research report on Thursday, October 24th. Pivotal Research boosted their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $215.00 to $225.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Scotiabank upgraded shares of Alphabet to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Friday, October 11th. Finally, Piper Sandler restated an “overweight” rating and issued a $210.00 price objective (up previously from $200.00) on shares of Alphabet in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Seven equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, thirty-one have given a buy rating and five have given a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Alphabet currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $205.51.

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.