Taylor Securities Services Inc. Purchases New Position in Alphabet Inc. $GOOGL

Taylor Securities Services Inc. bought a new position in Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) in the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The fund bought 3,943 shares of the information services provider’s stock, valued at approximately $1,234,000. Alphabet accounts for approximately 0.6% of Taylor Securities Services Inc.’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 17th biggest position.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its holdings in Alphabet by 2.4% in the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 528,969,322 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $165,567,398,000 after acquiring an additional 12,531,695 shares during the last quarter. State Street Corp boosted its position in shares of Alphabet by 1.8% during the 2nd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 229,954,269 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $40,524,841,000 after purchasing an additional 4,008,374 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC grew its stake in Alphabet by 1.9% in the fourth quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 146,193,037 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $45,625,595,000 after acquiring an additional 2,666,676 shares during the period. Norges Bank acquired a new position in Alphabet during the fourth quarter worth $30,534,239,000. Finally, Bank of America Corp DE boosted its stake in Alphabet by 4.9% during the 4th quarter. Bank of America Corp DE now owns 69,108,183 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $21,630,861,000 after purchasing an additional 3,218,852 shares during the last quarter. 40.03% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Alphabet Stock Up 0.1%

Shares of NASDAQ GOOGL opened at $368.48 on Monday. The stock has a market capitalization of $4.46 trillion, a P/E ratio of 28.11, a PEG ratio of 1.57 and a beta of 1.23. Alphabet Inc. has a one year low of $162.00 and a one year high of $408.61. The firm’s 50 day simple moving average is $367.04 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $332.07. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.16, a current ratio of 1.92 and a quick ratio of 1.92.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, April 29th. The information services provider reported $5.11 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.64 by $2.47. Alphabet had a net margin of 37.92% and a return on equity of 38.99%. The company had revenue of $109.90 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $106.98 billion. As a group, analysts expect that Alphabet Inc. will post 14.3 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Alphabet Increases Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, June 15th. Shareholders of record on Monday, June 8th were given a dividend of $0.22 per share. The ex-dividend date was Monday, June 8th. This is a positive change from Alphabet’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.21. This represents a $0.88 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.2%. Alphabet’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 6.71%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Alphabet

In other news, insider John Kent Walker sold 8,993 shares of Alphabet stock in a transaction dated Friday, March 27th. The stock was sold at an average price of $275.89, for a total value of $2,481,078.77. Following the transaction, the insider owned 51,808 shares in the company, valued at approximately $14,293,309.12. The trade was a 14.79% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, major shareholder 2019 Gp L.L.C. Gv sold 87,475 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, May 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $23.75, for a total value of $2,077,531.25. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. Over the last quarter, insiders sold 160,516 shares of company stock valued at $7,344,604. 11.61% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Alphabet News Summary

Here are the key news stories impacting Alphabet this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Alphabet is being viewed as a major AI winner thanks to ongoing investment in AI infrastructure and data centers, which could support future cloud and AI revenue growth. Article Title
• Positive Sentiment: Reports that Berkshire Hathaway nearly tripled its Alphabet position may be seen as a strong vote of confidence from a major long-term investor. Article Title
• Positive Sentiment: Coverage emphasizing Alphabet’s strong earnings and expanding Google Cloud backlog supports the case for continued fundamental improvement. Article Title
• Neutral Sentiment: Alphabet’s stock is drawing increased investor attention and analyst commentary, but these are mostly sentiment-driven mentions rather than new company-specific catalysts. Article Title
• Negative Sentiment: Noam Shazeer, a top Google DeepMind/Gemini AI leader, is leaving for OpenAI, underscoring the competitive AI talent war. Article Title
• Negative Sentiment: John Jumper is also departing Google DeepMind for Anthropic, adding to concerns that Alphabet may be losing key AI researchers. Article Title
• Negative Sentiment: Waymo’s recall of nearly 3,900 robotaxis after construction-zone driving errors raises safety and regulatory concerns for Alphabet’s autonomous vehicle business. Article Title
• Negative Sentiment: The UK ordering Google to improve search-ranking transparency highlights continued regulatory scrutiny over its core search business. Article Title

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of brokerages have issued reports on GOOGL. HSBC reaffirmed a “buy” rating and issued a $420.00 price objective (down from $435.00) on shares of Alphabet in a research report on Tuesday, June 2nd. Stifel Nicolaus set a $420.00 price objective on Alphabet and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, April 30th. UBS Group reissued a “neutral” rating on shares of Alphabet in a report on Wednesday, May 20th. China Renaissance upped their price target on Alphabet from $400.00 to $485.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Monday, May 4th. Finally, Oppenheimer increased their price objective on Alphabet from $425.00 to $445.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Friday, May 15th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, forty-seven have assigned a Buy rating and five have issued a Hold rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $413.13.

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.