Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) Stock Price Down 1.1% Following Insider Selling

Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL - Get Free Report)'s share price was down 1.1% on Friday after an insider sold shares in the company. The company traded as low as $152.20 and last traded at $152.61. Approximately 10,362,023 shares traded hands during mid-day trading, a decline of 64% from the average daily volume of 28,648,361 shares. The stock had previously closed at $154.28.

Specifically, CEO Sundar Pichai sold 32,500 shares of the company's stock in a transaction on Wednesday, May 7th. The shares were sold at an average price of $155.90, for a total transaction of $5,066,750.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 2,652,696 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $413,555,306.40. This represents a 1.21% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of analysts recently weighed in on GOOGL shares. Susquehanna decreased their price target on shares of Alphabet from $225.00 to $220.00 and set a "positive" rating for the company in a research report on Friday, April 25th. Wedbush set a $190.00 price target on shares of Alphabet and gave the stock an "outperform" rating in a research report on Tuesday, April 15th. Tigress Financial upped their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $220.00 to $240.00 and gave the company a "strong-buy" rating in a research report on Wednesday, April 30th. Royal Bank of Canada reissued an "outperform" rating and issued a $200.00 price objective on shares of Alphabet in a research report on Wednesday, April 23rd. Finally, UBS Group set a $195.00 price objective on shares of Alphabet in a research report on Friday, April 25th. Ten equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-six have assigned a buy rating and four have assigned a strong buy rating to the company's stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average target price of $199.75.

Alphabet Trading Down 1.0%

The stock has a market cap of $1.85 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 18.98, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.34 and a beta of 1.01. The firm's 50 day moving average is $158.93 and its two-hundred day moving average is $175.27. The company has a quick ratio of 1.84, a current ratio of 1.84 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.03.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL - Get Free Report) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, April 24th. The information services provider reported $2.81 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.02 by $0.79. Alphabet had a net margin of 28.60% and a return on equity of 32.49%. The company had revenue of $76.49 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $89.30 billion. During the same quarter last year, the business earned $1.89 earnings per share. Equities analysts anticipate that Alphabet Inc. will post 8.9 EPS for the current year.

Alphabet Increases Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, June 16th. Shareholders of record on Monday, June 9th will be paid a $0.21 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, June 9th. This represents a $0.84 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.55%. This is a positive change from Alphabet's previous quarterly dividend of $0.20. Alphabet's dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 9.36%.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Alphabet

Several large investors have recently made changes to their positions in GOOGL. Norges Bank bought a new position in shares of Alphabet in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $24,383,677,000. FMR LLC boosted its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 9.8% in the fourth quarter. FMR LLC now owns 248,416,916 shares of the information services provider's stock valued at $47,025,322,000 after acquiring an additional 22,100,902 shares in the last quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC boosted its holdings in Alphabet by 16,993.2% during the first quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 16,062,457 shares of the information services provider's stock worth $2,483,898,000 after buying an additional 15,968,487 shares in the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its holdings in Alphabet by 2.9% during the first quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 509,826,331 shares of the information services provider's stock worth $78,839,544,000 after buying an additional 14,307,345 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Northern Trust Corp boosted its holdings in Alphabet by 17.0% during the fourth quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 69,616,854 shares of the information services provider's stock worth $13,178,470,000 after buying an additional 10,135,430 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 40.03% 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.