Liberty Square Wealth Partners LLC Purchases New Position in Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL)

Liberty Square Wealth Partners LLC purchased a new position in shares of Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL - Free Report) during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm purchased 2,413 shares of the information services provider's stock, valued at approximately $447,000.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently modified their holdings of GOOGL. Compass Planning Associates Inc acquired a new position in Alphabet during the fourth quarter worth $30,000. E Fund Management Hong Kong Co. Ltd. grew its stake in shares of Alphabet by 518.8% during the 4th quarter. E Fund Management Hong Kong Co. Ltd. now owns 198 shares of the information services provider's stock worth $37,000 after purchasing an additional 166 shares during the period. Fiduciary Advisors Inc. purchased a new position in shares of Alphabet in the 4th quarter valued at about $39,000. PayPay Securities Corp lifted its stake in shares of Alphabet by 36.1% in the fourth quarter. PayPay Securities Corp now owns 245 shares of the information services provider's stock valued at $46,000 after purchasing an additional 65 shares during the period. Finally, Anderson Financial Strategies LLC purchased a new stake in Alphabet during the fourth quarter worth about $49,000. 40.03% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several equities analysts recently issued reports on GOOGL shares. Mizuho reduced their price objective on Alphabet from $230.00 to $205.00 and set an "outperform" rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, April 9th. KeyCorp lifted their price target on Alphabet from $185.00 to $195.00 and gave the stock an "overweight" rating in a research note on Friday, April 25th. Morgan Stanley lowered their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $210.00 to $185.00 and set an "overweight" rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, April 17th. Piper Sandler lifted their target price on shares of Alphabet from $185.00 to $195.00 and gave the stock an "overweight" rating in a research report on Friday, April 25th. Finally, DZ Bank downgraded shares of Alphabet from a "buy" rating to a "hold" rating and set a $198.00 price target on the stock. in a report on Thursday, February 6th. Ten investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-six have assigned a buy rating and four have issued a strong buy rating to the company's stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company presently has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus price target of $199.75.

Alphabet Stock Down 0.5%

GOOGL stock traded down $0.83 during trading on Thursday, reaching $171.53. The stock had a trading volume of 18,618,454 shares, compared to its average volume of 29,794,731. Alphabet Inc. has a one year low of $140.53 and a one year high of $207.05. The company's 50 day moving average is $159.04 and its two-hundred day moving average is $174.73. The company has a quick ratio of 1.84, a current ratio of 1.84 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.03. The company has a market capitalization of $2.08 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 21.27, a P/E/G ratio of 1.34 and a beta of 1.01.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL - Get Free Report) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, April 24th. The information services provider reported $2.81 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.02 by $0.79. The business had revenue of $76.49 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations 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 previous year, the firm earned $1.89 earnings per share. Equities research analysts forecast that Alphabet Inc. will post 8.9 EPS for the current year.

Alphabet Increases Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, June 16th. Investors of record on Monday, June 9th will be given a dividend of $0.21 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, June 9th. This represents a $0.84 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.49%. This is a positive change from Alphabet's previous quarterly dividend of $0.20. Alphabet's dividend payout ratio is presently 9.36%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Alphabet news, 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 transaction of $5,153,200.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 2,717,696 shares of the company's stock, valued at $430,917,877.76. The trade was a 1.18% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. Also, Director Kavitark Ram Shriram sold 10,500 shares of Alphabet stock in a transaction on 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 sale, the director now directly owns 261,966 shares of the company's stock, valued at $45,844,050. This represents a 3.85% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last 90 days, insiders sold 164,654 shares of company stock worth $26,793,380. Insiders own 11.55% of the company's stock.

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.