Lee Financial Co Lowers Stake in Alphabet Inc. $GOOGL

Key Points

• Lee Financial Co. cut its stake in Alphabet by 38.0% in Q4, selling 2,467 shares and leaving it with 4,025 shares valued at about $1.26 million, according to its SEC filing.
• Alphabet posted a quarterly beat (EPS $2.82 vs. $2.57; revenue $113.83B vs. $111.24B) and recent AI/product moves — new TPU chips, Gemini Enterprise Agent, a $750M partner fund and a multiyear $1B Merck cloud deal — have driven analyst price-target upgrades and a consensus "Moderate Buy" (average target ~$369.67).
• Notable insider selling has occurred recently (about 2,037,294 shares worth ~$94.2M sold in the past three months), while institutional investors own roughly 40.03% and corporate insiders 11.64% of the stock.

Lee Financial Co lowered its position in shares of Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL - Free Report) by 38.0% during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 4,025 shares of the information services provider's stock after selling 2,467 shares during the quarter. Lee Financial Co's holdings in Alphabet were worth $1,260,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other large investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in GOOGL. Brighton Jones LLC lifted its holdings in Alphabet by 3.9% during the fourth quarter. Brighton Jones LLC now owns 110,330 shares of the information services provider's stock valued at $20,886,000 after purchasing an additional 4,110 shares in the last quarter. Revolve Wealth Partners LLC lifted its holdings in Alphabet by 3.5% during the fourth quarter. Revolve Wealth Partners LLC now owns 14,930 shares of the information services provider's stock valued at $2,826,000 after purchasing an additional 506 shares in the last quarter. Matrix Asset Advisors Inc. NY raised its position in shares of Alphabet by 17.6% during the second quarter. Matrix Asset Advisors Inc. NY now owns 3,888 shares of the information services provider's stock valued at $685,000 after buying an additional 581 shares during the last quarter. Sequoia Financial Advisors LLC raised its position in shares of Alphabet by 11.2% during the second quarter. Sequoia Financial Advisors LLC now owns 485,486 shares of the information services provider's stock valued at $85,557,000 after buying an additional 48,805 shares during the last quarter. Finally, United Bank raised its position in shares of Alphabet by 6.9% during the second quarter. United Bank now owns 48,204 shares of the information services provider's stock valued at $8,495,000 after buying an additional 3,120 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 40.03% of the company's stock.

Alphabet Trading Up 2.1%

Shares of GOOGL opened at $339.32 on Thursday. The company's fifty day moving average is $307.93 and its 200 day moving average is $303.68. Alphabet Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $147.84 and a fifty-two week high of $349.00. The stock has a market capitalization of $4.10 trillion, a PE ratio of 31.39, a P/E/G ratio of 2.05 and a beta of 1.12. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.11, a quick ratio of 2.01 and a current ratio of 2.01.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL - Get Free Report) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, February 4th. The information services provider reported $2.82 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.57 by $0.25. Alphabet had a net margin of 32.81% and a return on equity of 35.01%. The company had revenue of $113.83 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $111.24 billion. Sell-side analysts expect that Alphabet Inc. will post 11.53 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Alphabet Announces Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, March 16th. Investors of record on Monday, March 9th were given a $0.21 dividend. This represents a $0.84 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.2%. The ex-dividend date was Monday, March 9th. Alphabet's payout ratio is currently 7.77%.

Alphabet News Summary

Here are the key news stories impacting Alphabet this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Alphabet unveiled two new custom AI chips — a TPU 8t for training and a TPU 8i for inference — positioned to lower cloud AI costs and compete with Nvidia on infrastructure. This supports cloud margin expansion and hardware/service revenue upside. Article Title
• Positive Sentiment: Google launched the Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform to build and deploy agentic AI for businesses — a strategic product aimed at monetizing generative AI across large enterprises and driving Google Cloud adoption. Article Title
• Positive Sentiment: Google Cloud committed a $750 million partner fund to accelerate agentic AI adoption among consulting, SI and software partners — an investment that can speed customer deployments and lift services revenue. Article Title
• Positive Sentiment: Merck announced a multiyear partnership, investing up to $1 billion in Google Cloud to deploy AI across R&D, manufacturing and commercial operations — a material enterprise win that validates Google’s enterprise AI stack. Article Title
• Positive Sentiment: Product integrations expand monetization vectors: major Workspace AI updates (drafting/Sheets automation) and Chrome “auto browse” enterprise features embed Gemini into user workflows, increasing stickiness and upsell potential. Article Title Article Title
• Positive Sentiment: Multiple analyst updates raised targets (BMO to $410; Cantor Fitzgerald and KeyCorp also raised targets), reflecting increased sell-side conviction about Alphabet’s AI/cash-flow upside. That analyst momentum often amplifies positive price reaction. Article Title
• Neutral Sentiment: Ecosystem and security partners (Exabeam, Vodafone, Thinking Machines Lab expansion) showed integrations and vendor deals that ease enterprise adoption but are longer‑term revenue drivers rather than immediate catalysts. Article Title
• Negative Sentiment: Offsetting items: a small insider sell note was reported, which prompted modest near-term selling pressure for some investors. Insider moves can weigh on sentiment even as fundamentals improve. Article Title

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

GOOGL has been the topic of several recent analyst reports. Needham & Company LLC reiterated a "buy" rating and set a $400.00 price objective on shares of Alphabet in a research report on Wednesday, April 8th. Jefferies Financial Group lifted their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $365.00 to $400.00 and gave the company a "buy" rating in a research report on Monday, February 2nd. Truist Financial set a $385.00 price objective on shares of Alphabet in a research report on Thursday, February 5th. Raymond James Financial upgraded shares of Alphabet from a "moderate buy" rating to a "strong-buy" rating in a research report on Thursday, January 22nd. Finally, President Capital lifted their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $323.00 to $375.00 and gave the company a "buy" rating in a research report on Tuesday, February 10th. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, forty-six have given a Buy rating and four have issued a Hold rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average price target of $369.67.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, Director John L. Hennessy sold 1,050 shares of the business's stock in a transaction on Wednesday, April 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $331.65, for a total value of $348,232.50. Following the sale, the director owned 3,581 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,187,638.65. The trade was a 22.67% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, insider John Kent Walker sold 8,993 shares of the business's 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 sale, the insider owned 51,808 shares in the company, valued at $14,293,309.12. This represents a 14.79% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. Insiders have sold a total of 2,037,294 shares of company stock valued at $94,216,897 in the last three months. Corporate insiders own 11.64% of the company's stock.

Alphabet Profile

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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