Southport Management L.L.C. Makes New Investment in Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG)

Southport Management L.L.C. acquired a new position in shares of Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG - Free Report) during the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm acquired 6,000 shares of the information services provider's stock, valued at approximately $1,143,000. Alphabet accounts for 4.2% of Southport Management L.L.C.'s holdings, making the stock its 8th largest holding.

Several other large investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. FMR LLC grew its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 2.8% during the 4th quarter. FMR LLC now owns 117,991,725 shares of the information services provider's stock worth $22,470,344,000 after purchasing an additional 3,189,592 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC grew its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 1.2% during the 4th quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 104,777,092 shares of the information services provider's stock worth $19,894,651,000 after purchasing an additional 1,219,606 shares in the last quarter. Capital International Investors grew its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 6.7% during the 4th quarter. Capital International Investors now owns 91,236,069 shares of the information services provider's stock worth $17,376,706,000 after purchasing an additional 5,758,244 shares in the last quarter. Northern Trust Corp grew its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 16.1% during the 4th quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 57,098,042 shares of the information services provider's stock worth $10,873,751,000 after purchasing an additional 7,917,625 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Capital Research Global Investors boosted its stake in Alphabet by 0.8% in the fourth quarter. Capital Research Global Investors now owns 39,148,500 shares of the information services provider's stock valued at $7,455,571,000 after buying an additional 294,556 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 27.26% of the company's stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

GOOG has been the topic of several research analyst reports. KeyCorp reduced their price objective on Alphabet from $202.00 to $185.00 and set an "overweight" rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, April 9th. Morgan Stanley reaffirmed an "overweight" rating on shares of Alphabet in a research note on Wednesday, February 5th. Citigroup reaffirmed a "sell" rating on shares of Alphabet in a research note on Wednesday, April 23rd. Cantor Fitzgerald reaffirmed a "neutral" rating and issued a $171.00 price objective on shares of Alphabet in a research note on Friday, April 25th. Finally, Needham & Company LLC lowered Alphabet from a "buy" rating to a "cautious" rating in a research note on Friday, May 2nd. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, five have assigned a hold rating, fourteen have assigned a buy rating and five have given a strong buy rating to the company's stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average target price of $203.94.

Alphabet Trading Up 1.2%

Shares of GOOG stock traded up $2.03 during mid-day trading on Friday, reaching $167.43. 35,833,672 shares of the stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 19,733,367. The stock's fifty day simple moving average is $160.19 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $176.75. Alphabet Inc. has a 1-year low of $142.66 and a 1-year high of $208.70. The company has a market cap of $2.03 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 20.80, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.34 and a beta of 1.01. The company has a quick ratio of 1.84, a current ratio of 1.84 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.03.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOG - Get Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, April 24th. The information services provider reported $2.81 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts' consensus estimates of $2.02 by $0.79. Alphabet had a return on equity of 32.49% and a net margin of 28.60%. The company had revenue of $90.23 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $89.30 billion. During the same period last year, the company earned $1.89 earnings per share. The firm's revenue was up 12.0% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, research analysts anticipate that Alphabet Inc. will post 8.89 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Alphabet Increases Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, June 16th. Stockholders of record on Monday, June 9th will be given a dividend of $0.21 per share. This represents a $0.84 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.50%. This is an increase from Alphabet's previous quarterly dividend of $0.20. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, June 9th. Alphabet's dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 9.36%.

Insider Transactions at Alphabet

In other Alphabet news, CEO Sundar Pichai sold 32,500 shares of Alphabet stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, April 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $158.56, for a total value of $5,153,200.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 2,717,696 shares in the company, valued at approximately $430,917,877.76. The trade was a 1.18% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, CAO Amie Thuener O'toole sold 673 shares of Alphabet stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, April 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $155.33, for a total value of $104,537.09. Following the completion of the sale, the chief accounting officer now owns 15,303 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $2,377,014.99. The trade was a 4.21% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 179,324 shares of company stock worth $30,153,353 over the last ninety days. 12.99% of the stock is owned by insiders.

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.