Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) Shares Bought by Everest Management Corp.

Everest Management Corp. boosted its holdings in shares of Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) by 67.2% in the 1st quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 43,577 shares of the information services provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 17,517 shares during the quarter. Alphabet comprises 6.2% of Everest Management Corp.’s holdings, making the stock its 3rd largest holding. Everest Management Corp.’s holdings in Alphabet were worth $6,808,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently added to or reduced their stakes in GOOG. WFA Asset Management Corp grew its stake in shares of Alphabet by 51.4% in the first quarter. WFA Asset Management Corp now owns 1,697 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $258,000 after buying an additional 576 shares in the last quarter. Farther Finance Advisors LLC grew its stake in shares of Alphabet by 43.9% in the first quarter. Farther Finance Advisors LLC now owns 101,237 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $16,085,000 after buying an additional 30,898 shares in the last quarter. Moss Adams Wealth Advisors LLC grew its stake in shares of Alphabet by 4.2% in the first quarter. Moss Adams Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 24,350 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $3,804,000 after buying an additional 980 shares in the last quarter. Wiser Wealth Management Inc grew its stake in shares of Alphabet by 6.8% in the first quarter. Wiser Wealth Management Inc now owns 1,399 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $218,000 after buying an additional 89 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Greystone Financial Group LLC grew its stake in shares of Alphabet by 29.5% in the first quarter. Greystone Financial Group LLC now owns 4,386 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $685,000 after buying an additional 1,000 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 27.26% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities research analysts have recently weighed in on GOOG shares. Rosenblatt Securities raised Alphabet from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Friday, April 25th. UBS Group dropped their price objective on Alphabet from $209.00 to $173.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, April 11th. KeyCorp lowered their target price on Alphabet from $202.00 to $185.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, April 9th. Needham & Company LLC cut Alphabet from a “buy” rating to a “cautious” rating in a research note on Friday, May 2nd. Finally, Scotiabank lowered their target price on Alphabet from $232.00 to $200.00 and set a “sector outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, April 21st. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, five have issued a hold rating, fourteen have issued a buy rating and five have assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $204.88.

Alphabet Trading Up 1.5%

GOOG opened at $177.63 on Tuesday. Alphabet Inc. has a one year low of $142.66 and a one year high of $208.70. The company has a market cap of $2.16 trillion, a P/E ratio of 22.07, a PEG ratio of 1.34 and a beta of 1.01. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.03, a quick ratio of 1.84 and a current ratio of 1.84. The business’s 50-day simple moving average is $162.26 and its 200-day simple moving average is $176.17.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOG) last released its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, April 24th. The information services provider reported $2.81 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.02 by $0.79. Alphabet had a return on equity of 32.49% and a net margin of 28.60%. The business had revenue of $90.23 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $89.30 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business posted $1.89 EPS. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 12.0% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, equities research analysts expect that Alphabet Inc. will post 8.89 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Alphabet Increases Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, June 16th. Stockholders of record on Monday, June 9th will be issued a $0.21 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, June 9th. This represents a $0.84 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.47%. This is an increase from Alphabet’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.20. Alphabet’s dividend payout ratio is presently 9.36%.

Insider Activity at Alphabet

In related news, CEO Sundar Pichai sold 32,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, April 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $158.56, for a total value of $5,153,200.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 2,717,696 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $430,917,877.76. This represents a 1.18% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, Director John L. Hennessy sold 200 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, March 13th. The shares were sold at an average price of $165.53, for a total value of $33,106.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director now directly owns 7,813 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,293,285.89. This trade represents a 2.50% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 195,770 shares of company stock valued at $32,036,638 in the last three months. 12.99% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

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.