Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) Shares Purchased by Arvest Investments Inc.

Arvest Investments Inc. increased its holdings in Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL - Free Report) by 54.3% during the 1st quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The fund owned 16,189 shares of the information services provider's stock after purchasing an additional 5,695 shares during the period. Arvest Investments Inc.'s holdings in Alphabet were worth $2,504,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other large investors also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Norges Bank bought a new position in Alphabet during the fourth quarter valued at $24,383,677,000. FMR LLC increased its position in Alphabet by 9.8% during 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 during the last quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC increased its position 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 valued at $2,483,898,000 after acquiring an additional 15,968,487 shares during the last quarter. Northern Trust Corp increased its position 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 valued at $13,178,470,000 after acquiring an additional 10,135,430 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Capital Research Global Investors increased its position in Alphabet by 16.2% during the fourth quarter. Capital Research Global Investors now owns 72,033,086 shares of the information services provider's stock valued at $13,635,878,000 after acquiring an additional 10,037,685 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 40.03% of the company's stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of analysts have recently issued reports on the stock. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lowered their target price on shares of Alphabet from $220.00 to $180.00 and set an "overweight" rating for the company in a research note on Tuesday, April 8th. Morgan Stanley lowered their target price on shares of Alphabet from $210.00 to $185.00 and set an "overweight" rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, April 17th. DA Davidson lowered their target price on shares of Alphabet from $200.00 to $160.00 and set a "neutral" rating for the company in a research note on Monday, April 14th. Wells Fargo & Company boosted their target price on shares of Alphabet from $167.00 to $175.00 and gave the company an "equal weight" rating in a research note on Friday, April 25th. Finally, Piper Sandler boosted their target price on shares of Alphabet from $185.00 to $195.00 and gave the company an "overweight" rating in a research note on Friday, April 25th. Ten equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-six have issued a buy rating and four have issued a strong buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Alphabet presently has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus target price of $199.75.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, Director Kavitark Ram Shriram sold 10,500 shares of Alphabet stock in a transaction dated Thursday, May 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $175.00, for a total transaction of $1,837,500.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director now owns 261,966 shares in the company, valued at approximately $45,844,050. This trade represents a 3.85% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, CEO Sundar Pichai sold 32,500 shares of Alphabet stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, April 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $158.56, for a total value of $5,153,200.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 2,717,696 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $430,917,877.76. This represents a 1.18% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last quarter, insiders sold 195,570 shares of company stock worth $32,003,532. 11.64% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Alphabet Price Performance

Alphabet stock traded down $1.03 during trading hours on Friday, hitting $174.67. The stock had a trading volume of 27,636,835 shares, compared to its average volume of 30,440,616. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.03, a current ratio of 1.84 and a quick ratio of 1.84. The stock has a market capitalization of $2.12 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 21.70, a PEG ratio of 1.34 and a beta of 1.01. Alphabet Inc. has a 1-year low of $140.53 and a 1-year high of $207.05. The stock's fifty day moving average is $162.89 and its two-hundred day moving average is $174.64.

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

Alphabet Increases Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, June 16th. Investors of record on Monday, June 9th will be paid a dividend of $0.21 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, June 9th. This represents a $0.84 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.48%. This is a positive change from Alphabet's previous quarterly dividend of $0.20. Alphabet's dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 9.36%.

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.