Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) Receives $200.56 Consensus Target Price from Analysts

Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) has earned an average recommendation of “Moderate Buy” from the twenty-one research firms that are covering the stock, Marketbeat.com reports. Five equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold recommendation, thirteen have issued a buy recommendation and three have assigned a strong buy recommendation to the company. The average 1 year price target among analysts that have updated their coverage on the stock in the last year is $200.56.

A number of brokerages have issued reports on GOOG. UBS Group lifted their target price on shares of Alphabet from $187.00 to $192.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. Oppenheimer lifted their target price on shares of Alphabet from $185.00 to $215.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note 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. Canaccord Genuity Group lifted their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $220.00 to $225.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. Finally, Cantor Fitzgerald raised shares of Alphabet to a “hold” rating in a research note on Thursday, September 5th.

Alphabet Trading Up 0.7 %

NASDAQ GOOG opened at $170.62 on Friday. The firm’s 50 day moving average price is $169.51 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $171.86. The stock has a market cap of $2.09 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 22.63, a PEG ratio of 1.16 and a beta of 1.04. Alphabet has a twelve month low of $129.40 and a twelve month high of $193.31. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.04, a quick ratio of 1.95 and a current ratio of 1.95.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOG) last issued its earnings results on Tuesday, October 29th. The information services provider reported $2.12 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.83 by $0.29. The company had revenue of $88.27 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $86.39 billion. Alphabet had a net margin of 27.74% and a return on equity of 31.66%. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 15.1% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter last year, the business posted $1.55 EPS. Equities analysts anticipate that Alphabet will post 8.02 EPS for the current year.

Alphabet Announces Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, December 16th. Stockholders of record on Monday, December 9th will be issued a dividend of $0.20 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, December 9th. This represents a $0.80 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.47%. Alphabet’s payout ratio is 10.61%.

Insider Transactions at Alphabet

In other news, CAO Amie Thuener O’toole sold 682 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, September 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $160.44, for a total transaction of $109,420.08. Following the transaction, the chief accounting officer now owns 32,017 shares in the company, valued at approximately $5,136,807.48. The trade was a 2.09 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, insider John Kent Walker sold 21,467 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, September 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $160.35, for a total transaction of $3,442,233.45. Following the transaction, the insider now owns 39,334 shares in the company, valued at approximately $6,307,206.90. The trade was a 35.31 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last 90 days, insiders have sold 206,795 shares of company stock worth $34,673,866. 12.99% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. China Universal Asset Management Co. Ltd. increased its stake in Alphabet by 360.1% in the first quarter. China Universal Asset Management Co. Ltd. now owns 20,249 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $3,083,000 after acquiring an additional 15,848 shares during the period. Quent Capital LLC increased its stake in Alphabet by 5.8% in the first quarter. Quent Capital LLC now owns 32,706 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $4,980,000 after acquiring an additional 1,798 shares during the period. Advisors Asset Management Inc. increased its stake in Alphabet by 27.1% in the first quarter. Advisors Asset Management Inc. now owns 10,645 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $1,621,000 after acquiring an additional 2,269 shares during the period. Kestra Advisory Services LLC increased its stake in Alphabet by 11.1% in the first quarter. Kestra Advisory Services LLC now owns 459,466 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $69,958,000 after acquiring an additional 45,882 shares during the period. Finally, BOKF NA boosted its position in Alphabet by 5.8% in the first quarter. BOKF NA now owns 320,576 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $50,170,000 after buying an additional 17,627 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 27.26% of the company’s stock.

Alphabet Company 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.