Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) Earns “Buy” Rating from Needham & Company LLC

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL)‘s stock had its “buy” rating reiterated by Needham & Company LLC in a research note issued to investors on Friday,Benzinga reports. They presently have a $178.00 price target on the information services provider’s stock. Needham & Company LLC’s price target points to a potential upside of 9.90% from the stock’s current price.

GOOGL has been the subject of several other research reports. Susquehanna lowered their price objective on Alphabet from $225.00 to $220.00 and set a “positive” rating for the company in a research report on Friday. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lowered their price target on shares of Alphabet from $220.00 to $180.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research report on Tuesday, April 8th. Piper Sandler upped their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $185.00 to $195.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Friday. Morgan Stanley lowered their target price on shares of Alphabet from $210.00 to $185.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, April 17th. Finally, Westpark Capital upgraded Alphabet to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, April 1st. Ten investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-five have assigned a buy rating and five have given a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $198.63.

Alphabet Trading Up 1.7 %

NASDAQ:GOOGL opened at $161.96 on Friday. The company has a 50-day moving average price of $162.18 and a 200-day moving average price of $175.52. The stock has a market cap of $1.97 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 20.12, a P/E/G ratio of 1.34 and a beta of 1.03. The company has a current ratio of 1.84, a quick ratio of 1.84 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.03. Alphabet has a 12 month low of $140.53 and a 12 month high of $207.05.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, April 24th. The information services provider reported $2.81 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.02 by $0.79. The business had revenue of $76.49 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $89.30 billion. Alphabet had a return on equity of 32.49% and a net margin of 28.60%. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $1.89 EPS. Equities analysts predict that Alphabet will post 8.9 EPS for the current year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, CEO Sundar Pichai sold 32,500 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, April 16th. The stock was sold at an average price of $156.16, for a total value of $5,075,200.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 2,685,196 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $419,320,207.36. The trade was a 1.20 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this link. Also, Director Kavitark Ram Shriram sold 29,066 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, February 18th. The stock was sold at an average price of $184.89, for a total value of $5,374,012.74. Following the completion of the transaction, the director now owns 272,466 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $50,376,238.74. The trade was a 9.64 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 148,163 shares of company stock worth $25,361,647 over the last three months. 11.55% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Institutional Trading of Alphabet

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of GOOGL. Heritage Investment Group Inc. grew its position in shares of Alphabet by 14.7% during the first quarter. Heritage Investment Group Inc. now owns 3,128 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $484,000 after purchasing an additional 400 shares in the last quarter. Alta Advisers Ltd boosted its stake in Alphabet by 52.1% during the first quarter. Alta Advisers Ltd now owns 29,479 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $4,559,000 after buying an additional 10,100 shares during the last quarter. Hixon Zuercher LLC grew its holdings in Alphabet by 1.3% during the 1st quarter. Hixon Zuercher LLC now owns 28,583 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $4,420,000 after buying an additional 371 shares in the last quarter. Sage Advisors LLC increased its stake in Alphabet by 13.4% in the 1st quarter. Sage Advisors LLC now owns 1,868 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $289,000 after acquiring an additional 221 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Unified Investment Management raised its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 4.2% during the 1st quarter. Unified Investment Management now owns 5,481 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $848,000 after acquiring an additional 222 shares in the last quarter. 40.03% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

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.