Sterling Investment Management LLC Acquires 1,381 Shares of Alphabet Inc. $GOOG

Sterling Investment Management LLC boosted its holdings in shares of Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) by 6.1% during the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The institutional investor owned 24,007 shares of the information services provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 1,381 shares during the quarter. Alphabet comprises about 4.3% of Sterling Investment Management LLC’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 5th biggest position. Sterling Investment Management LLC’s holdings in Alphabet were worth $7,533,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other institutional investors have also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Nvest Wealth Strategies Inc. bought a new stake in Alphabet in the fourth quarter valued at about $38,000. Imprint Wealth LLC bought a new stake in Alphabet in the third quarter valued at about $31,000. Manning & Napier Advisors LLC bought a new stake in Alphabet in the third quarter valued at about $32,000. Towne Trust Company N.A increased its stake in Alphabet by 34.0% in the fourth quarter. Towne Trust Company N.A now owns 134 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $42,000 after acquiring an additional 34 shares during the period. Finally, Creative Capital Management Investments LLC increased its stake in Alphabet by 1,438.5% in the fourth quarter. Creative Capital Management Investments LLC now owns 200 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $63,000 after acquiring an additional 187 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 27.26% of the company’s stock.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, Director Frances Arnold sold 102 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, April 30th. The stock was sold at an average price of $371.00, for a total value of $37,842.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director directly owned 18,621 shares in the company, valued at approximately $6,908,391. This trade represents a 0.54% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Also, CEO Sundar Pichai sold 32,500 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, March 18th. The shares were sold at an average price of $307.89, for a total value of $10,006,425.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer owned 1,642,060 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $505,573,853.40. This trade represents a 1.94% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. Insiders sold a total of 157,953 shares of company stock valued at $47,767,818 in the last 90 days. 12.99% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of brokerages have recently issued reports on GOOG. TD Cowen increased their target price on Alphabet from $375.00 to $450.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, April 30th. Needham & Company LLC set a $400.00 target price on Alphabet and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, March 13th. KeyCorp set a $370.00 target price on Alphabet in a report on Thursday, February 5th. DZ Bank raised Alphabet to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Monday, February 16th. Finally, Pivotal Research reissued a “buy” rating and set a $470.00 price objective (up from $420.00) on shares of Alphabet in a report on Wednesday, April 29th. Six analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-eight have issued a Buy rating and four have assigned a Hold rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Alphabet has a consensus rating of “Buy” and an average target price of $362.73.

Alphabet Price Performance

NASDAQ:GOOG opened at $397.17 on Friday. The firm has a market cap of $4.81 trillion, a PE ratio of 30.30, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.71 and a beta of 1.25. Alphabet Inc. has a 12 month low of $163.33 and a 12 month high of $399.93. The company has a quick ratio of 1.92, a current ratio of 1.92 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.16. The company’s 50-day moving average price is $325.64 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $316.44.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOG) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, April 30th. The information services provider reported $5.11 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.68 by $2.43. The business had revenue of $109.90 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $106.96 billion. Alphabet had a return on equity of 38.99% and a net margin of 37.92%.Alphabet’s revenue for the quarter was up 21.8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the company earned $2.81 EPS. On average, equities analysts anticipate that Alphabet Inc. will post 14.28 EPS for the current fiscal 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 boost from Alphabet’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.21. The ex-dividend date is Monday, June 8th. This represents a $0.88 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.2%. Alphabet’s dividend payout ratio is currently 6.41%.

Key Headlines Impacting Alphabet

Here are the key news stories impacting Alphabet this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Alphabet’s AI and cloud businesses are being cited as key growth drivers, with reports emphasizing strong revenue growth, improving cloud margins, and a large backlog supporting future expansion.
• Positive Sentiment: New product and platform launches, including Googlebook laptops and broader Gemini AI integrations, are reinforcing the view that Alphabet can monetize AI across both software and hardware.
• Positive Sentiment: Analyst and investor commentary remains upbeat, with multiple bullish ratings, higher price targets, and articles arguing Alphabet still has room to run after its post-earnings surge. Article Title
• Positive Sentiment: Reports that Anthropic plans to spend heavily on Google infrastructure add to the narrative that Alphabet is becoming a central provider of AI compute capacity.

Alphabet Company Profile

Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ: GOOG) is a multinational technology holding company headquartered in Mountain View, California. Formed in 2015 through a corporate restructuring of Google, Alphabet serves as the parent to Google LLC and a portfolio of businesses collectively known as “Other Bets.” Google was originally founded in 1998 by Larry Page and Sergey Brin; Alphabet is led by CEO Sundar Pichai, who oversees Google and the broader company while the founders remain prominent shareholders and influential figures in the company’s history.

Alphabet’s core business centers on internet search and advertising, with Google Search and the company’s ad platforms (including Google Ads and AdSense) generating the majority of revenue by connecting advertisers with consumers worldwide.