Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOG) Stock Jumps 1.6% – Time to Buy?

Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG)’s stock price traded up 1.6% during mid-day trading on Thursday. The stock traded as high as $299.25 and last traded at $295.35. Approximately 21,686,093 shares changed hands during mid-day trading, an increase of 4% from the average daily volume of 20,872,775 shares. The stock had previously closed at $290.63.

Key Headlines Impacting Alphabet

These are some of the GOOG headlines that stood out recently:

• Positive Sentiment: Nvidia’s reported leadership turmoil could give cloud customers more reason to diversify chip suppliers. Analyst Ming-Chi Kuo sees Alphabet’s Tensor Processing Units, developed with Broadcom and MediaTek, as potential beneficiaries. Nvidia succession uncertainty opens door for Google TPU and Broadcom, analyst says
• Positive Sentiment: Google is expanding its consumer AI reach: pre-orders are opening for its AI smart glasses with Samsung, and Gemini Live is coming to Apple CarPlay. These launches could widen product adoption, though their financial contribution is not yet clear. Google and Samsung launch pre-orders for AI smart glasses Google rolls out Gemini AI voice assistant to Apple CarPlay dashboards
• Neutral Sentiment: Warren Buffett’s successor Greg Abel has continued Berkshire Hathaway’s investment in Alphabet, with Berkshire reportedly buying more than 60 million shares since he became CEO. This is a vote of confidence, but does not guarantee near-term buying or business performance. Warren Buffett’s successor has nearly $110 billion invested in two tech stocks

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities research analysts recently commented on the company. Piper Sandler reiterated an “overweight” rating and issued a $345.00 target price on shares of Alphabet in a research report on Thursday, October 29th. Benchmark reissued a “buy” rating on shares of Alphabet in a research report on Thursday, October 29th. TD Cowen restated a “buy” rating and set a $460.00 price objective (down from $485.00) on shares of Alphabet in a research note on Thursday, October 29th. Morgan Stanley reaffirmed an “overweight” rating and issued a $375.00 price objective on shares of Alphabet in a report on Thursday, October 29th. Finally, Rosenblatt Securities assumed coverage on shares of Alphabet in a research note on Thursday, August 20th. They issued a “buy” rating on the stock. Six research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, thirty-five have assigned a Buy rating, five have assigned a Hold rating and one has issued a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Alphabet has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $413.38.

Alphabet Stock Up 1.6%

The company has a quick ratio of 2.69, a current ratio of 2.79 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.19. The stock has a market cap of $3.63 trillion, a PE ratio of 15.41, a P/E/G ratio of 0.86 and a beta of 1.21. The business has a 50 day moving average price of $326.81 and a 200 day moving average price of $336.38.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOG) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, October 29th. The information services provider reported $2.12 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $3.01 by ($0.89). The company had revenue of $127.58 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $127.97 billion. Alphabet had a return on equity of 43.33% and a net margin of 50.03%. The firm’s revenue was up 24.7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the business earned $2.87 earnings per share. Equities research analysts expect that Alphabet Inc. will post 19.74 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Alphabet Announces Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, December 14th. Shareholders of record on Monday, December 7th will be given a $0.22 dividend. This represents a $0.88 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.3%. The ex-dividend date is Monday, December 7th. Alphabet’s dividend payout ratio is currently 4.59%.

Insider Activity at Alphabet

In other news, Director Frances Arnold sold 83 shares of Alphabet stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, September 30th. The shares were sold at an average price of $340.45, for a total transaction of $28,257.35. Following the completion of the transaction, the director directly owned 19,076 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $6,494,424.20. The trade was a 0.43% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Over the last 90 days, insiders have sold 247 shares of company stock worth $79,238. 12.99% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Institutional Trading of Alphabet

A number of hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Morton Brown Family Wealth LLC boosted its stake in shares of Alphabet by 135.5% during the 3rd quarter. Morton Brown Family Wealth LLC now owns 73 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $25,000 after acquiring an additional 42 shares in the last quarter. Castlekeep Investment Advisors LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Alphabet during the 2nd quarter valued at about $29,000. Livelsberger Financial Advisory acquired a new stake in shares of Alphabet during the 3rd quarter valued at about $37,000. Toth Financial Advisory Corp purchased a new position in shares of Alphabet in the 2nd quarter valued at about $41,000. Finally, Timbuktu Capital Management LLC purchased a new position in shares of Alphabet in the 2nd quarter valued at about $46,000. 27.26% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Alphabet Company Profile

Alphabet is a technology holding company whose primary business is Google. Founded in 1998 by Larry Page and Sergey Brin, Google became part of Alphabet when the company adopted a holding-company structure in 2015. Sundar Pichai leads Alphabet and Google as chief executive officer. Google offers internet search, online advertising, cloud computing, and software and hardware products. Its services and products include Google Search, YouTube, Android, Chrome, Google Maps, Google Play, and Google Cloud.