Atlas Capital Advisors Inc. Takes $12.08 Million Position in Alphabet Inc. $GOOGL

Key Points

• Atlas Capital Advisors disclosed a new fourth-quarter stake in Alphabet, buying 38,584 shares valued at about $12.08 million. Alphabet now represents roughly 1.3% of the firm’s portfolio and its 10th-largest position.
• Other major institutions also added to Alphabet, including Vanguard, State Street, Geode Capital Management, Norges Bank and Capital World Investors, underscoring broad institutional confidence in the stock. Institutional investors as a group own 40.03% of Alphabet shares.
• Analysts remain generally upbeat after Alphabet’s strong quarterly results, which beat estimates on both EPS and revenue, and the company also raised its quarterly dividend to $0.22 per share. The stock currently carries a Moderate Buy consensus with a $413.13 price target.

Atlas Capital Advisors Inc. acquired a new stake in shares of Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL - Free Report) in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm acquired 38,584 shares of the information services provider's stock, valued at approximately $12,077,000. Alphabet makes up about 1.3% of Atlas Capital Advisors Inc.'s investment portfolio, making the stock its 10th largest position.

Other large investors also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 2.4% in the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 528,969,322 shares of the information services provider's stock worth $165,567,398,000 after buying an additional 12,531,695 shares during the period. State Street Corp boosted its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 1.8% during the second quarter. State Street Corp now owns 229,954,269 shares of the information services provider's stock worth $40,524,841,000 after purchasing an additional 4,008,374 shares during the period. Geode Capital Management LLC boosted its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 1.9% during the fourth quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 146,193,037 shares of the information services provider's stock worth $45,625,595,000 after purchasing an additional 2,666,676 shares during the period. Norges Bank acquired a new stake in shares of Alphabet during the fourth quarter worth approximately $30,534,239,000. Finally, Capital World Investors boosted its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 1.5% during the fourth quarter. Capital World Investors now owns 53,881,908 shares of the information services provider's stock worth $16,865,158,000 after purchasing an additional 774,336 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 40.03% of the company's stock.

Insider Activity at Alphabet

In other Alphabet news, insider John Kent Walker sold 8,993 shares of the firm's stock in a transaction dated Friday, March 27th. The stock was sold at an average price of $275.89, for a total transaction of $2,481,078.77. Following the transaction, the insider directly owned 51,808 shares in the company, valued at $14,293,309.12. This trade represents a 14.79% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Also, major shareholder 2019 Gp L.L.C. Gv sold 87,475 shares of Alphabet stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, May 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $23.75, for a total transaction of $2,077,531.25. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. Over the last quarter, insiders sold 193,016 shares of company stock valued at $17,282,549. Insiders own 11.61% of the company's stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several research firms recently commented on GOOGL. Arete Research raised their price target on shares of Alphabet from $405.00 to $425.00 and gave the stock a "buy" rating in a report on Monday, May 18th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. restated a "buy" rating on shares of Alphabet in a report on Monday, May 4th. Weiss Ratings restated a "buy (b)" rating on shares of Alphabet in a report on Monday, April 20th. Susquehanna restated a "positive" rating and set a $460.00 price target (up from $400.00) on shares of Alphabet in a report on Thursday, April 30th. Finally, Wolfe Research decreased their price target on shares of Alphabet from $390.00 to $360.00 and set an "outperform" rating for the company in a report on Friday, April 10th. Two analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, forty-seven have assigned a Buy rating and five have given a Hold rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus price target of $413.13.

Alphabet Price Performance

Shares of GOOGL opened at $359.68 on Friday. The firm has a market cap of $4.36 trillion, a PE ratio of 27.44, a PEG ratio of 1.54 and a beta of 1.23. The firm's 50 day moving average price is $360.45 and its 200 day moving average price is $330.26. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.16, a quick ratio of 1.92 and a current ratio of 1.92. Alphabet Inc. has a twelve month low of $162.00 and a twelve month high of $408.61.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL - Get Free Report) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, April 29th. The information services provider reported $5.11 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.64 by $2.47. Alphabet had a return on equity of 38.99% and a net margin of 37.92%.The company had revenue of $109.90 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $106.98 billion. As a group, research analysts expect that Alphabet Inc. will post 14.3 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Alphabet Increases Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, June 15th. Shareholders of record on Monday, June 8th will be issued a dividend of $0.22 per share. This represents a $0.88 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.2%. This is an increase from Alphabet's previous quarterly dividend of $0.21. The ex-dividend date is Monday, June 8th. Alphabet's dividend payout ratio is 6.71%.

Trending Headlines about Alphabet

Here are the key news stories impacting Alphabet this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Alphabet’s drone unit Wing expanded its Walmart partnership into seven more U.S. cities, pushing the service toward nearly 20 markets and signaling that drone delivery is moving from experiment to scalable business. Alphabet's Most Overlooked Division Just Had a Big Week
• Positive Sentiment: Waymo launched a new $29.99 monthly membership program with perks for frequent riders, a move that suggests the robotaxi business is building recurring revenue on top of rapid ride-growth. Waymo launches premier subscription tier for $29.99 a month, starting in select cities
• Positive Sentiment: TD Cowen raised its price target on Alphabet, adding to the bullish analyst backdrop and supporting the view that the stock still has room to run. Alphabet (GOOGL) Among Our Good Stocks to Buy Now
• Positive Sentiment: Bank of America and other commentary highlighted Alphabet as a long-term AI beneficiary, especially as rising model costs could strengthen demand for Google Cloud and infrastructure. Anthropic's Priciest AI Model Yet Is Here. Why Alphabet and Amazon Will Benefit.
• Neutral Sentiment: Alphabet sued an alleged Chinese cybercrime group accused of using Google’s AI tools to run scam operations, which shows the company is actively defending its platform but is not likely to move the stock much on its own. Google sues alleged Chinese cybercrime operation that used AI to send scam texts
• Neutral Sentiment: Some investors noted that Altimeter Capital fully exited its Alphabet stake in Q1, but this appears more like portfolio repositioning than a company-specific warning. Billionaire Brad Gerstner Dumped All of His Alphabet Then Bought 2 Stocks Nobody Expected

About Alphabet

Alphabet Inc is the holding company created in 2015 to organize Google and a portfolio of businesses developing technologies beyond Google's core internet services. Its principal operations are led by Google, which builds and operates consumer-facing products such as Google Search, YouTube, Android, Chrome, Gmail, Google Maps and Google Workspace, as well as advertising platforms (Google Ads and AdSense) that historically generate the majority of its revenue. Google also develops consumer hardware (Pixel phones, Nest smart-home devices, Chromecast) and developer and distribution platforms such as Google Play.

Beyond Google's consumer and advertising businesses, Alphabet invests in enterprise and infrastructure offerings through Google Cloud, which provides cloud computing, data analytics and productivity services to businesses and institutions.

Want to see what other hedge funds are holding GOOGL? Visit HoldingsChannel.com to get the latest 13F filings and insider trades for Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL - Free Report).

This instant news alert was generated by narrative science technology and financial data from MarketBeat in order to provide readers with the fastest reporting and unbiased coverage. Please send any questions or comments about this story to contact@marketbeat.com.