BMO Capital Markets Reaffirms Outperform Rating for Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL)

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL)‘s stock had its “outperform” rating reaffirmed by investment analysts at BMO Capital Markets in a research note issued to investors on Monday, Benzinga reports. They presently have a $222.00 target price on the information services provider’s stock. BMO Capital Markets’ price target would suggest a potential upside of 40.85% from the stock’s current price.

GOOGL has been the subject of a number of other research reports. Cantor Fitzgerald started coverage on shares of Alphabet in a research note on Thursday, September 5th. They issued a “neutral” rating and a $190.00 price target for the company. Argus upped their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $200.00 to $215.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, July 16th. Rosenblatt Securities reaffirmed a “neutral” rating and issued a $181.00 price objective on shares of Alphabet in a research note on Wednesday, July 24th. Piper Sandler cut their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $206.00 to $200.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research note on Tuesday, September 10th. Finally, Jefferies Financial Group upped their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $215.00 to $220.00 in a research note on Tuesday, July 9th. Eight research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-eight have issued a buy rating and two have given a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $201.08.

Alphabet Price Performance

GOOGL stock opened at $157.61 on Monday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.04, a current ratio of 2.08 and a quick ratio of 2.08. Alphabet has a one year low of $120.21 and a one year high of $191.75. The stock has a market cap of $1.94 trillion, a PE ratio of 24.17, a P/E/G ratio of 1.13 and a beta of 1.04. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of $167.46 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $164.87.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) last released its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, July 23rd. The information services provider reported $1.89 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.85 by $0.04. Alphabet had a net margin of 26.70% and a return on equity of 30.49%. The business had revenue of $84.74 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $70.60 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company earned $1.44 EPS. On average, analysts predict that Alphabet will post 7.64 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, CEO Sundar Pichai sold 22,500 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Thursday, June 20th. The shares were sold at an average price of $177.40, for a total transaction of $3,991,500.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 2,213,011 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $392,588,151.40. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. In other news, CEO Sundar Pichai sold 22,500 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, June 20th. The shares were sold at an average price of $177.40, for a total transaction of $3,991,500.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 2,213,011 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $392,588,151.40. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, CAO Amie Thuener O’toole sold 682 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, July 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $183.47, for a total transaction of $125,126.54. Following the sale, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 30,650 shares in the company, valued at approximately $5,623,355.50. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 179,367 shares of company stock worth $30,016,931 in the last three months. 11.55% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Trading of Alphabet

Institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 0.8% in the first quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 497,874,324 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $75,144,172,000 after buying an additional 4,064,073 shares during the last quarter. Norges Bank purchased a new position in shares of Alphabet in the fourth quarter worth approximately $15,441,917,000. Capital Research Global Investors boosted its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 14.4% in the first quarter. Capital Research Global Investors now owns 57,803,291 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $8,724,251,000 after buying an additional 7,275,757 shares during the last quarter. Bank of New York Mellon Corp boosted its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 0.5% in the second quarter. Bank of New York Mellon Corp now owns 49,472,478 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $9,011,412,000 after buying an additional 238,403 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Fisher Asset Management LLC boosted its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 3.3% in the fourth quarter. Fisher Asset Management LLC now owns 45,178,075 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $6,310,925,000 after buying an additional 1,429,261 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 40.03% of the company’s stock.

About Alphabet

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.