Alphabet Inc. $GOOGL Shares Sold by Manning & Napier Advisors LLC

Manning & Napier Advisors LLC lowered its position in shares of Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) by 26.0% in the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The fund owned 724,054 shares of the information services provider’s stock after selling 253,771 shares during the period. Alphabet makes up 2.9% of Manning & Napier Advisors LLC’s portfolio, making the stock its 7th largest position. Manning & Napier Advisors LLC’s holdings in Alphabet were worth $227,244,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other large investors have also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Brighton Jones LLC boosted 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 worth $20,886,000 after purchasing an additional 4,110 shares during the last quarter. Revolve Wealth Partners LLC boosted 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 worth $2,826,000 after purchasing an additional 506 shares during the last quarter. Matrix Asset Advisors Inc. NY boosted its holdings in 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 worth $685,000 after purchasing an additional 581 shares during the last quarter. Sequoia Financial Advisors LLC boosted its holdings in Alphabet by 11.2% during the second quarter. Sequoia Financial Advisors LLC now owns 485,486 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $85,557,000 after purchasing an additional 48,805 shares during the last quarter. Finally, United Bank boosted its holdings in Alphabet by 6.9% during the second quarter. United Bank now owns 48,204 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $8,495,000 after purchasing an additional 3,120 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 40.03% of the company’s stock.

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.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

GOOGL has been the subject of several recent research reports. Robert W. Baird increased their target price on shares of Alphabet from $380.00 to $400.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday, April 30th. Loop Capital lifted their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $355.00 to $490.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, May 15th. Citigroup reissued an “outperform” rating on shares of Alphabet in a research report on Monday, May 4th. Phillip Securities lifted their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $340.00 to $395.00 and gave the company a “moderate buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, April 15th. Finally, Freedom Capital downgraded shares of Alphabet from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Monday, May 4th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, forty-seven have given a Buy rating and five have assigned a Hold rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $412.65.

Alphabet News Summary

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.

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) 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%.

Alphabet Company 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.