Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) Shares Up 1.3% – Time to Buy?

Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) rose 1.3% during mid-day trading on Thursday . The stock traded as high as $369.48 and last traded at $368.4810. 43,864,580 shares were traded during mid-day trading, an increase of 38% from the average daily volume of 31,884,113 shares. The stock had previously closed at $363.79.

Key Alphabet News

Here are the key news stories impacting Alphabet this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Berkshire Hathaway disclosed that it nearly tripled its Alphabet stake to about 57.8 million shares, worth roughly $16.6 billion, signaling strong long-term confidence in Alphabet’s business and valuation.
• Positive Sentiment: Alphabet is drawing bullish commentary after strong earnings momentum, with reports highlighting accelerating Google Cloud growth and a much larger cloud backlog, reinforcing the company’s AI and enterprise platform opportunity.
• Positive Sentiment: HSBC announced a multi-year partnership with Google Cloud to expand AI usage, adding another high-profile enterprise customer and underscoring demand for Alphabet’s cloud and AI services. HSBC partners with Google Cloud to expand AI usage
• Positive Sentiment: Some analysts and market commentary continue to frame GOOGL as an attractive AI and cloud stock versus peers, citing earnings momentum and the company’s broad product footprint.
• Neutral Sentiment: Alphabet continues to receive strategic attention around AI leadership, including commentary on Gemini, smart-home devices, and cloud expansion, but these stories are mostly long-term positioning rather than immediate financial catalysts.
• Neutral Sentiment: Google/Waymo also remains in the spotlight after a robotaxi recall tied to construction-zone handling issues, which may matter more for sentiment than for near-term Alphabet earnings. Waymo to recall over 3,800 robotaxis over risk of entering closed construction zones
• Negative Sentiment: A key AI talent setback emerged as Noam Shazeer, a Gemini co-lead and major Google AI figure, is leaving for OpenAI, adding to concerns about competition for top AI researchers. Google’s Gemini co-lead Noam Shazeer to join OpenAI
• Negative Sentiment: Alphabet is facing continued regulatory pressure in the UK, where authorities are imposing stricter requirements on search fairness and transparency, which could weigh on search monetization flexibility over time.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of analysts have recently weighed in on GOOGL shares. Truist Financial set a $430.00 price objective on Alphabet and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, May 29th. Phillip Securities increased their price target on Alphabet from $340.00 to $395.00 and gave the company a “moderate buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, April 15th. UBS Group reissued a “neutral” rating on shares of Alphabet in a report on Wednesday, May 20th. Daiwa Securities Group boosted their price target on Alphabet from $380.00 to $445.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, May 5th. Finally, Oppenheimer upped their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $425.00 to $445.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Friday, May 15th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, forty-seven have given a Buy rating and five have assigned a Hold rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Alphabet currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $413.13.

Alphabet Trading Up 1.3%

The stock has a 50-day moving average of $364.75 and a 200 day moving average of $331.35. The stock has a market cap of $4.46 trillion, a PE ratio of 28.11, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.60 and a beta of 1.23. The company has a quick ratio of 1.92, a current ratio of 1.92 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.16.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, April 29th. The information services provider reported $5.11 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping 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 analyst estimates of $106.98 billion. As a group, sell-side analysts anticipate that Alphabet Inc. will post 14.3 earnings per share for the current year.

Alphabet Increases Dividend

The business 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 of this dividend was Monday, June 8th. This represents a $0.88 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.2%. This is an increase from Alphabet’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.21. Alphabet’s payout ratio is 6.71%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Alphabet

In other news, Director John L. Hennessy sold 1,050 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, May 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $393.26, for a total value of $412,923.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director owned 2,531 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $995,341.06. The trade was a 29.32% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. Also, major shareholder 2019 Gp L.L.C. Gv sold 87,475 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, May 15th. The stock was 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. In the last three months, insiders have sold 159,466 shares of company stock worth $6,957,543. Insiders own 11.61% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of large investors have recently modified their holdings of the company. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its position in shares of Alphabet by 2.4% during the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 528,969,322 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $165,567,398,000 after buying an additional 12,531,695 shares in the last quarter. State Street Corp increased its holdings in Alphabet by 1.8% in 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 acquiring an additional 4,008,374 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC raised its position in Alphabet by 1.9% during the fourth quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 146,193,037 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $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 lifted its holdings in Alphabet by 4.9% during the fourth 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 in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 40.03% of the company’s stock.

About Alphabet

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.