City State Bank Grows Stock Holdings in Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL)

City State Bank increased its stake in Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) by 27.1% during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 1,874 shares of the information services provider’s stock after buying an additional 400 shares during the period. City State Bank’s holdings in Alphabet were worth $355,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Lantz Financial LLC increased its holdings in Alphabet by 10.8% in the 2nd quarter. Lantz Financial LLC now owns 4,622 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $842,000 after buying an additional 452 shares in the last quarter. Spectrum Wealth Advisory Group LLC purchased a new position in shares of Alphabet in the 2nd quarter worth $218,000. Vance Wealth Inc. grew its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 4.0% in the second quarter. Vance Wealth Inc. now owns 3,089 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $563,000 after acquiring an additional 119 shares during the period. Tobam increased its position in Alphabet by 64.3% during the second quarter. Tobam now owns 24,833 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $4,523,000 after acquiring an additional 9,718 shares during the last quarter. Finally, D.A. Davidson & CO. lifted its holdings in Alphabet by 4.8% in the second quarter. D.A. Davidson & CO. now owns 427,320 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $77,836,000 after acquiring an additional 19,423 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 40.03% of the company’s stock.

Alphabet Stock Down 1.2 %

Shares of NASDAQ:GOOGL traded down $2.27 during trading hours on Monday, hitting $189.77. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 7,504,154 shares, compared to its average volume of 21,874,508. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.04, a current ratio of 1.95 and a quick ratio of 1.95. The firm’s fifty day moving average price is $182.62 and its 200 day moving average price is $172.95. Alphabet Inc. has a 52 week low of $130.66 and a 52 week high of $201.42. The company has a market capitalization of $2.32 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 25.17, a P/E/G ratio of 1.35 and a beta of 0.98.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, October 29th. The information services provider reported $2.12 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.83 by $0.29. The business had revenue of $88.27 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $72.85 billion. Alphabet had a return on equity of 31.66% and a net margin of 27.74%. During the same period last year, the business posted $1.55 EPS. As a group, research analysts expect that Alphabet Inc. will post 8.01 EPS for the current year.

Alphabet Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, December 16th. Shareholders of record on Monday, December 9th were issued a $0.20 dividend. This represents a $0.80 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.42%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, December 9th. Alphabet’s dividend payout ratio is currently 10.61%.

Insider Transactions at Alphabet

In other Alphabet news, CAO Amie Thuener O’toole sold 2,834 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, October 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $167.23, for a total transaction of $473,929.82. Following the sale, the chief accounting officer now owns 26,349 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $4,406,343.27. The trade was a 9.71 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. Also, CEO Sundar Pichai sold 22,500 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, October 16th. The stock was sold at an average price of $166.30, for a total transaction of $3,741,750.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 2,106,806 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $350,361,837.80. This represents a 1.06 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last three months, insiders have sold 154,387 shares of company stock valued at $27,748,931. Corporate insiders own 11.55% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

GOOGL has been the subject of a number of recent research reports. Wells Fargo & Company boosted their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $187.00 to $190.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Monday. Seaport Res Ptn raised Alphabet from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, October 29th. Citizens Jmp downgraded Alphabet from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 2nd. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted their price objective on Alphabet from $212.00 to $232.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, December 18th. Finally, Phillip Securities upgraded shares of Alphabet to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Friday, November 1st. Nine equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, thirty have assigned a buy rating and four have assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $207.90.

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.