Denali Advisors LLC Sells 3,000 Shares of Alphabet Inc. $GOOGL

Key Points

• Denali Advisors LLC cut its Alphabet stake by 40% in the fourth quarter, selling 3,000 shares and leaving it with 4,500 shares valued at about $1.4 million.
• Alphabet continues to draw strong analyst support, with multiple firms raising price targets and the stock carrying a Moderate Buy consensus and average target price of $412.65.
• The company reported a strong quarter, beating earnings and revenue estimates, and it also raised its quarterly dividend to $0.22 per share from $0.21.

Denali Advisors LLC decreased its holdings in shares of Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL - Free Report) by 40.0% in the 4th quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The fund owned 4,500 shares of the information services provider's stock after selling 3,000 shares during the period. Denali Advisors LLC's holdings in Alphabet were worth $1,408,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in the company. CIBC Bancorp USA Inc. acquired a new position in shares of Alphabet in the 3rd quarter valued at $416,217,000. Sovran Advisors LLC lifted its position in Alphabet by 23.6% in the 3rd quarter. Sovran Advisors LLC now owns 22,219 shares of the information services provider's stock valued at $5,401,000 after acquiring an additional 4,241 shares in the last quarter. Wright Investors Service Inc. lifted its position in Alphabet by 21.2% in the 3rd quarter. Wright Investors Service Inc. now owns 50,064 shares of the information services provider's stock valued at $12,171,000 after acquiring an additional 8,746 shares in the last quarter. Belpointe Asset Management LLC lifted its position in Alphabet by 5.4% in the 3rd quarter. Belpointe Asset Management LLC now owns 72,608 shares of the information services provider's stock valued at $17,652,000 after acquiring an additional 3,740 shares in the last quarter. Finally, CIBC Asset Management Inc lifted its position in Alphabet by 3.8% in the 3rd quarter. CIBC Asset Management Inc now owns 1,666,577 shares of the information services provider's stock valued at $405,131,000 after acquiring an additional 60,831 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 40.03% of the company's stock.

Trending Headlines about Alphabet

Here are the key news stories impacting Alphabet this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Alphabet is testing Gemini-powered Search ads, including conversational and contextual ad formats that could improve monetization and help offset concerns that AI search may weaken its core advertising model.
• Positive Sentiment: Google and CrowdStrike helped take down a botnet targeting open-source software developers, reinforcing Alphabet’s cybersecurity capabilities and its role in defending the broader internet ecosystem.
• Positive Sentiment: Reports around Google I/O and Alphabet’s broader AI lineup, including new Gemini features and AI search tools, suggest the company is still aggressively innovating to defend its leadership in search and advertising.
• Neutral Sentiment: Google’s $15 billion Missouri AI data hub investment highlights long-term infrastructure spending to support AI growth, but the near-term stock impact is likely limited.
• Neutral Sentiment: Alphabet has drawn market focus from traders and analysts, with prediction-market activity suggesting shares may stay near current levels in the short term.
• Negative Sentiment: DuckDuckGo reported rising installs as some users respond negatively to Google’s AI Search overhaul, raising investor concerns that the redesign could push a portion of users toward competitors.
• Negative Sentiment: CEO Sundar Pichai acknowledged that one Google AI Search result was “more opinionated than it should be,” underscoring the risk of AI accuracy issues and potential user trust problems.
• Negative Sentiment: Federal prosecutors charged a Google employee with insider trading tied to Polymarket bets, creating a reputational overhang even though the case appears to involve an individual employee rather than core business operations.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

GOOGL has been the topic of several research reports. Royal Bank Of Canada set a $425.00 price objective on shares of Alphabet and gave the company an "outperform" rating in a research report on Thursday, April 30th. HSBC boosted their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $385.00 to $435.00 and gave the company a "buy" rating in a research report on Thursday, April 30th. Oppenheimer boosted their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $425.00 to $445.00 and gave the company an "outperform" rating in a research report on Friday, May 15th. China Renaissance boosted their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $400.00 to $485.00 and gave the company a "buy" rating in a research report on Monday, May 4th. Finally, BMO Capital Markets boosted their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $410.00 to $435.00 and gave the company an "outperform" rating in a research report on Thursday, April 30th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, forty-seven have issued a Buy rating and five have assigned a Hold rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Alphabet currently has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average target price of $412.65.

Alphabet Stock Performance

NASDAQ GOOGL opened at $388.83 on Thursday. The firm has a 50-day moving average of $342.73 and a 200-day moving average of $323.73. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.16, a quick ratio of 1.92 and a current ratio of 1.92. The stock has a market cap of $4.71 trillion, a PE ratio of 29.66, a P/E/G ratio of 1.66 and a beta of 1.26. Alphabet Inc. has a 52-week low of $162.00 and a 52-week 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 (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts' consensus estimates of $2.64 by $2.47. The company had revenue of $109.90 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $106.98 billion. Alphabet had a net margin of 37.92% and a return on equity of 38.99%. On average, sell-side analysts anticipate that Alphabet Inc. will post 14.29 EPS for the current year.

Alphabet Increases Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, June 15th. Investors of record on Monday, June 8th will be given a dividend of $0.22 per share. 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%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, June 8th. Alphabet's payout ratio is 6.41%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Alphabet

In related news, insider John Kent Walker sold 8,993 shares of the firm's stock in a transaction dated Friday, March 27th. The shares were 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 of the company's stock, valued at approximately $14,293,309.12. This trade represents a 14.79% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, major shareholder 2019 Gp L.L.C. Gv sold 87,475 shares of the firm's stock in a transaction dated Friday, May 15th. The stock was 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. Insiders sold 226,481 shares of company stock valued at $27,422,061 in the last quarter. Company insiders own 11.61% of the company's stock.

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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