Matauro LLC Acquires New Shares in Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG)

Matauro LLC bought a new position in shares of Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) during the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The firm bought 6,777 shares of the information services provider’s stock, valued at approximately $1,291,000.

Several other hedge funds have also recently bought and sold shares of GOOG. Variant Private Wealth LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Alphabet in the fourth quarter worth about $826,000. Bell Bank raised its stake in shares of Alphabet by 1.7% in the 4th quarter. Bell Bank now owns 32,726 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $6,232,000 after acquiring an additional 541 shares in the last quarter. Dividend Assets Capital LLC lifted its holdings in Alphabet by 10.5% in the 4th quarter. Dividend Assets Capital LLC now owns 2,422 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $461,000 after purchasing an additional 230 shares during the last quarter. Greystone Financial Group LLC boosted its position in Alphabet by 4.9% during the fourth quarter. Greystone Financial Group LLC now owns 3,386 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $645,000 after purchasing an additional 159 shares during the period. Finally, Capital Advisory Group Advisory Services LLC grew its holdings in Alphabet by 25.1% during the fourth quarter. Capital Advisory Group Advisory Services LLC now owns 5,378 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $1,024,000 after purchasing an additional 1,078 shares during the last quarter. 27.26% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of analysts have recently weighed in on GOOG shares. Scotiabank boosted their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $212.00 to $240.00 and gave the stock a “sector outperform” rating in a research note on Friday, January 24th. Oppenheimer boosted their target price on shares of Alphabet from $215.00 to $225.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Thursday, January 30th. Jefferies Financial Group upped their price target on shares of Alphabet from $220.00 to $235.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Pivotal Research lifted their price objective on Alphabet from $215.00 to $225.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased their target price on Alphabet from $208.00 to $212.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, six have issued a hold rating, fourteen have issued a buy rating and three have given a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $209.13.

Alphabet Trading Down 2.1 %

Shares of Alphabet stock opened at $177.37 on Wednesday. Alphabet Inc. has a 52-week low of $131.55 and a 52-week high of $208.70. The firm has a market capitalization of $2.16 trillion, a PE ratio of 22.03, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.34 and a beta of 1.00. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.03, a current ratio of 1.84 and a quick ratio of 1.84. The company’s fifty day moving average price is $193.29 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $177.66.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOG) last posted its earnings results on Tuesday, February 4th. The information services provider reported $2.15 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.12 by $0.03. Alphabet had a net margin of 28.60% and a return on equity of 32.49%. On average, analysts expect that Alphabet Inc. will post 8.89 EPS for the current year.

Alphabet Dividend Announcement

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, March 17th. Stockholders of record on Monday, March 10th will be issued a $0.20 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Monday, March 10th. This represents a $0.80 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.45%. Alphabet’s payout ratio is presently 9.94%.

Insider Transactions at Alphabet

In other Alphabet news, CAO Amie Thuener O’toole sold 1,367 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, December 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $170.41, for a total transaction of $232,950.47. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 23,515 shares in the company, valued at $4,007,191.15. This represents a 5.49 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. Also, insider Ruth Porat sold 17,690 shares of Alphabet stock in a transaction on Friday, February 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $183.48, for a total value of $3,245,761.20. Following the transaction, the insider now directly owns 1,449,286 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $265,914,995.28. The trade was a 1.21 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last ninety days, insiders sold 134,299 shares of company stock valued at $25,055,751. Corporate insiders own 12.99% 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.