Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) Stock Holdings Lessened by Cornerstone Advisory LLC

Cornerstone Advisory LLC trimmed its stake in Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) by 11.6% in the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The firm owned 72,776 shares of the information services provider’s stock after selling 9,558 shares during the quarter. Alphabet comprises 1.5% of Cornerstone Advisory LLC’s portfolio, making the stock its 17th largest holding. Cornerstone Advisory LLC’s holdings in Alphabet were worth $13,480,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

A number of other hedge funds have also made changes to their positions in GOOGL. Rockbridge Capital Management LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Alphabet in the fourth quarter worth $3,119,000. Optivise Advisory Services LLC grew its stake in shares of Alphabet by 8.0% in the fourth quarter. Optivise Advisory Services LLC now owns 5,464 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $1,035,000 after acquiring an additional 403 shares during the last quarter. Community Bank N.A. grew its stake in shares of Alphabet by 6.4% in the fourth quarter. Community Bank N.A. now owns 46,173 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $8,741,000 after acquiring an additional 2,790 shares during the last quarter. Premier Fund Managers Ltd grew its stake in shares of Alphabet by 30.0% in the fourth quarter. Premier Fund Managers Ltd now owns 61,792 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $11,816,000 after acquiring an additional 14,262 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Absolute Capital Management LLC grew its stake in shares of Alphabet by 14.0% in the fourth quarter. Absolute Capital Management LLC now owns 2,096 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $401,000 after acquiring an additional 258 shares during the last quarter. 40.03% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several brokerages have recently issued reports on GOOGL. Bank of America raised their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $185.00 to $200.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, April 25th. Wedbush set a $190.00 price objective on Alphabet and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Tuesday, April 15th. Westpark Capital reaffirmed a “buy” rating and issued a $210.00 price target on shares of Alphabet in a report on Thursday, May 8th. Citigroup lifted their price target on Alphabet from $195.00 to $200.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, April 25th. Finally, Stifel Nicolaus cut their price target on Alphabet from $225.00 to $192.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, April 23rd. Ten analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-six have assigned a buy rating and four have issued a strong buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $199.75.

Insider Activity

In other Alphabet news, CAO Amie Thuener O’toole sold 1,374 shares of Alphabet stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, March 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $173.47, for a total value of $238,347.78. Following the completion of the sale, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 15,024 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,606,213.28. The trade was a 8.38% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, CEO Sundar Pichai sold 32,500 shares of Alphabet stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, May 7th. The stock was sold at an average price of $155.90, for a total value of $5,066,750.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 2,652,696 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $413,555,306.40. The trade was a 1.21% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last three months, insiders have sold 129,744 shares of company stock valued at $20,968,366. 11.64% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Alphabet Stock Performance

NASDAQ:GOOGL opened at $168.56 on Thursday. The stock’s 50-day simple moving average is $158.29 and its 200 day simple moving average is $174.88. The firm has a market capitalization of $2.05 trillion, a PE ratio of 20.94, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.34 and a beta of 1.01. The company has a quick ratio of 1.84, a current ratio of 1.84 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.03. Alphabet Inc. has a twelve month low of $140.53 and a twelve month high of $207.05.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) last released 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 analyst estimates of $89.30 billion. Alphabet had a return on equity of 32.49% and a net margin of 28.60%. During the same period last year, the firm posted $1.89 earnings per share. On average, analysts anticipate that Alphabet Inc. will post 8.9 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Alphabet Increases Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, June 16th. Stockholders of record on Monday, June 9th will be paid a dividend of $0.21 per share. This represents a $0.84 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.50%. This is a positive change from Alphabet’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.20. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, June 9th. Alphabet’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 9.36%.

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.