Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOG) Stock Price Down 0.5% After Insider Selling

Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG)’s stock price was down 0.5% during mid-day trading on Wednesday following insider selling activity. The company traded as low as $166.57 and last traded at $168.04. Approximately 3,692,793 shares were traded during mid-day trading, a decline of 82% from the average daily volume of 20,282,992 shares. The stock had previously closed at $168.96.

Specifically, CEO Sundar Pichai sold 22,500 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, August 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $167.66, for a total transaction of $3,772,350.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 2,159,885 shares in the company, valued at $362,126,319.10. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, Director John L. Hennessy sold 700 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, August 16th. The stock was sold at an average price of $165.00, for a total value of $115,500.00. Following the transaction, the director now directly owns 29,324 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $4,838,460. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In other news, SVP Prabhakar Raghavan sold 34,257 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, August 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $162.60, for a total transaction of $5,570,188.20. Following the transaction, the senior vice president now owns 312,210 shares in the company, valued at approximately $50,765,346. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several analysts have recently issued reports on the stock. Rosenblatt Securities lowered shares of Alphabet from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $181.00 target price on the stock. in a research report on Friday, June 28th. Oppenheimer boosted their price objective on Alphabet from $205.00 to $210.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, July 24th. TD Cowen raised their target price on Alphabet from $200.00 to $220.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, July 10th. Finally, Wolfe Research upgraded Alphabet to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, July 16th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a hold rating, six have assigned a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Buy” and a consensus price target of $182.86.

Alphabet Stock Performance

The stock has a 50-day moving average of $176.56 and a 200 day moving average of $164.35. The stock has a market cap of $2.07 trillion, a PE ratio of 25.64, a P/E/G ratio of 1.28 and a beta of 1.05. The company has a quick ratio of 2.08, a current ratio of 2.08 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.04.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOG) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, July 23rd. The information services provider reported $1.89 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.85 by $0.04. Alphabet had a return on equity of 30.49% and a net margin of 26.70%. The business had revenue of $84.74 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $84.22 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $1.44 EPS. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 13.6% compared to the same quarter last year. Equities analysts predict that Alphabet Inc. will post 7.62 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Alphabet Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, September 16th. Shareholders of record on Monday, September 9th will be issued a $0.20 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Monday, September 9th. This represents a $0.80 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.48%. Alphabet’s payout ratio is 12.27%.

Institutional Trading of Alphabet

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the company. Norges Bank acquired a new stake in Alphabet during the fourth quarter worth $4,101,040,000. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised its holdings in Alphabet by 19.7% in the 1st quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 84,171,721 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $12,815,986,000 after buying an additional 13,876,534 shares during the period. Swedbank AB acquired a new position in Alphabet in the first quarter valued at about $1,378,708,000. Capital International Investors lifted its position in Alphabet by 9.3% in the first quarter. Capital International Investors now owns 87,716,562 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $13,355,724,000 after buying an additional 7,470,042 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Mitsubishi UFJ Asset Management Co. Ltd. boosted its stake in Alphabet by 51.8% during the first quarter. Mitsubishi UFJ Asset Management Co. Ltd. now owns 6,416,150 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $976,923,000 after buying an additional 2,190,795 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 27.26% of the company’s stock.

Alphabet Company 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.