Buttonwood Financial Advisors Inc. Cuts Holdings in Alphabet Inc. $GOOGL

Key Points

• Buttonwood Financial Advisors cut its Alphabet stake by 4% in the fourth quarter, selling 2,914 shares and leaving it with 70,267 shares worth about $22.0 million. Alphabet remains the fund’s second-largest position, accounting for 7.3% of its portfolio.
• Despite that trim, Alphabet continues to attract major institutional support and bullish analyst coverage. Big investors like Vanguard and State Street increased holdings, while analysts currently assign the stock a Moderate Buy consensus with a price target of $412.94.
• Alphabet’s fundamentals and growth story remain strong, with Q1 earnings beating expectations and key momentum coming from Google Cloud and AI-related partnerships. The company also raised its quarterly dividend to $0.22 per share from $0.21.

Buttonwood Financial Advisors Inc. reduced its holdings in Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL - Free Report) by 4.0% during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The fund owned 70,267 shares of the information services provider's stock after selling 2,914 shares during the quarter. Alphabet comprises 7.3% of Buttonwood Financial Advisors Inc.'s investment portfolio, making the stock its 2nd largest position. Buttonwood Financial Advisors Inc.'s holdings in Alphabet were worth $21,993,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other large investors have also recently made changes to their positions in GOOGL. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its stake in shares of Alphabet by 2.4% in the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 528,969,322 shares of the information services provider's stock valued at $165,567,398,000 after purchasing an additional 12,531,695 shares during the period. State Street Corp lifted its stake in shares of Alphabet by 1.8% in the 2nd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 229,954,269 shares of the information services provider's stock valued at $40,524,841,000 after purchasing an additional 4,008,374 shares during the period. Capital World Investors lifted its stake in shares of Alphabet by 28.0% in the 3rd quarter. Capital World Investors now owns 53,107,572 shares of the information services provider's stock valued at $12,910,542,000 after purchasing an additional 11,605,785 shares during the period. Capital Research Global Investors lifted its stake in shares of Alphabet by 15.7% in the 3rd quarter. Capital Research Global Investors now owns 50,732,476 shares of the information services provider's stock valued at $12,333,076,000 after purchasing an additional 6,874,381 shares during the period. Finally, Invesco Ltd. lifted its stake in shares of Alphabet by 2.3% in the 3rd quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 45,186,112 shares of the information services provider's stock valued at $10,984,744,000 after purchasing an additional 1,034,292 shares during the period. 40.03% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of research analysts have recently commented on GOOGL shares. Royal Bank Of Canada set a $425.00 target price on Alphabet and gave the company an "outperform" rating in a research note on Thursday, April 30th. Rosenblatt Securities restated a "neutral" rating and issued a $393.00 target price on shares of Alphabet in a research note on Thursday, May 21st. Oppenheimer raised their target price on Alphabet from $425.00 to $445.00 and gave the company an "outperform" rating in a research note on Friday, May 15th. China Renaissance raised their target price on Alphabet from $400.00 to $485.00 and gave the company a "buy" rating in a research note on Monday, May 4th. Finally, New Street Research raised their target price on Alphabet from $380.00 to $450.00 and gave the company a "buy" rating in a research note on Monday, May 4th. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, forty-seven have given a Buy rating and five have issued a Hold rating to the company's stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus price target of $412.94.

Key Stories Impacting Alphabet

Here are the key news stories impacting Alphabet this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Google Cloud reported standout Q1’26 results, with revenue up 63% to $20 billion, a 32.9% margin, and a backlog that reached $462 billion, suggesting strong demand and improving profitability. GOOGL Rides on Surging Google Cloud Demand: More Upside Ahead?
• Positive Sentiment: Alphabet and Blackstone announced a partnership to build 500MW of U.S. data center capacity by 2027, underscoring Alphabet’s push to monetize TPU-powered AI compute as a service. Google and Blackstone partner on TPU-powered data centre capacity
• Positive Sentiment: Alphabet’s buy rating was reaffirmed by Barclays, adding to the bullish analyst tone around the stock. Alphabet Class A (GOOGL) Gets a Buy from Cantor Fitzgerald
• Positive Sentiment: Reuters reported that EQT partnered with Google Cloud to accelerate AI adoption across more than 300 portfolio companies, reinforcing Alphabet’s enterprise AI momentum. Private equity firm EQT partners with Google Cloud for AI rollout
• Neutral Sentiment: Waymo continued expanding its robotaxi fleet with lower-cost vehicles and new rider access, which supports Alphabet’s optionality in autonomous driving but is not an immediate earnings driver. Waymo opens Ojai robotaxis to select riders as company aims to lower cost of fleet expansion
• Negative Sentiment: Alphabet is facing fresh reputational and legal pressure after U.S. prosecutors charged a Google engineer in a Polymarket insider-trading case, and an Indian court ruling raised trademark-related ad risk. Indian court ruling on Google keyword ads could reshape online advertising
• Negative Sentiment: Some commentary also suggested Alphabet could face pressure as AI rivals like OpenAI and Anthropic raise larger funding war chests, keeping competition concerns in focus. Anthropic Leapfrogs OpenAI In Valuation. But Here's One Thing To Know.

Insider Buying and Selling at Alphabet

In other Alphabet news, insider John Kent Walker sold 8,993 shares of Alphabet stock in a transaction on 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 completion of the transaction, the insider owned 51,808 shares in the company, valued at approximately $14,293,309.12. The trade was a 14.79% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, Director John L. Hennessy sold 1,050 shares of Alphabet stock in a transaction on Friday, May 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $393.26, for a total value of $412,923.00. Following the transaction, the director owned 2,531 shares of the company's stock, valued at $995,341.06. The trade was a 29.32% decrease in their position. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. Insiders have sold 226,369 shares of company stock valued at $27,388,127 in the last ninety days. Corporate insiders own 11.61% of the company's stock.

Alphabet Price Performance

Shares of NASDAQ:GOOGL opened at $380.34 on Monday. The stock has a fifty day simple moving average of $345.77 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $325.15. The stock has a market capitalization of $4.61 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 29.01, a PEG ratio of 1.63 and a beta of 1.23. Alphabet Inc. has a 12-month low of $162.00 and a 12-month high of $408.61. The company has a current ratio of 1.92, a quick ratio of 1.92 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.16.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL - Get Free Report) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, April 29th. The information services provider reported $5.11 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts' consensus estimates of $2.64 by $2.47. The business had revenue of $109.90 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $106.98 billion. Alphabet had a return on equity of 38.99% and a net margin of 37.92%. On average, research analysts anticipate that Alphabet Inc. will post 14.29 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 15th. Shareholders of record on Monday, June 8th will be paid a dividend of $0.22 per share. The ex-dividend date is Monday, June 8th. This is a positive change from Alphabet's previous quarterly dividend of $0.21. This represents a $0.88 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.2%. Alphabet's dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 6.41%.

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.

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