Benjamin Edwards Inc. Increases Stake in Alphabet Inc. $GOOGL

Benjamin Edwards Inc. boosted its stake in Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) by 45.5% in the 3rd quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm owned 203,909 shares of the information services provider’s stock after buying an additional 63,756 shares during the period. Benjamin Edwards Inc.’s holdings in Alphabet were worth $49,572,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other large investors have also bought and sold shares of GOOGL. Brighton Jones LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 3.9% during the fourth quarter. Brighton Jones LLC now owns 110,330 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $20,886,000 after purchasing an additional 4,110 shares during the last quarter. Revolve Wealth Partners LLC increased its position in Alphabet by 3.5% during the 4th quarter. Revolve Wealth Partners LLC now owns 14,930 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $2,826,000 after buying an additional 506 shares in the last quarter. Financiere des Professionnels Fonds d investissement inc. raised its stake in Alphabet by 32.2% during the second quarter. Financiere des Professionnels Fonds d investissement inc. now owns 51,507 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $9,077,000 after buying an additional 12,547 shares during the last quarter. Affiance Financial LLC boosted its holdings in Alphabet by 1.0% in the second quarter. Affiance Financial LLC now owns 9,854 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $1,737,000 after acquiring an additional 100 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Park Capital Management LLC WI grew its stake in shares of Alphabet by 1.1% in the second quarter. Park Capital Management LLC WI now owns 6,005 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $1,058,000 after acquiring an additional 65 shares during the last quarter. 40.03% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Alphabet Price Performance

NASDAQ GOOGL opened at $330.00 on Monday. The company has a 50-day moving average price of $311.33 and a 200-day moving average price of $255.38. Alphabet Inc. has a 52 week low of $140.53 and a 52 week high of $340.49. The company has a quick ratio of 1.75, a current ratio of 1.75 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.06. The firm has a market capitalization of $3.98 trillion, a P/E ratio of 32.54, a PEG ratio of 1.82 and a beta of 1.08.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) last announced its earnings results on Wednesday, October 29th. The information services provider reported $2.87 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.29 by $0.58. Alphabet had a net margin of 32.23% and a return on equity of 35.00%. The company had revenue of $102.35 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $99.90 billion. Equities research analysts anticipate that Alphabet Inc. will post 8.9 earnings per share for the current year.

Alphabet Dividend Announcement

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, December 15th. Investors of record on Monday, December 8th were given a dividend of $0.21 per share. The ex-dividend date was Monday, December 8th. This represents a $0.84 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.3%. Alphabet’s payout ratio is 8.28%.

Insider Activity at Alphabet

In other Alphabet news, insider John Kent Walker sold 17,829 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, December 30th. The stock was sold at an average price of $314.89, for a total value of $5,614,173.81. Following the completion of the sale, the insider owned 42,972 shares in the company, valued at $13,531,453.08. This represents a 29.32% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, CAO Amie Thuener O’toole sold 2,778 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, December 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $312.30, for a total value of $867,569.40. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief accounting officer directly owned 8,962 shares in the company, valued at $2,798,832.60. This trade represents a 23.66% decrease in their position. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. Over the last three months, insiders have sold 189,909 shares of company stock worth $57,927,282. Corporate insiders own 11.64% of the company’s stock.

More Alphabet News

Here are the key news stories impacting Alphabet this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Big AI monetization wins — Apple’s decision to build next‑gen Siri on Google’s Gemini (a central catalyst behind Alphabet topping a ~$4 trillion valuation) implies licensing revenue and much broader Gemini distribution, which supports revenue and margins. Read More.
• Positive Sentiment: Analyst backing — recent upgrades and a higher price target (e.g., Bank of America raised its GOOGL target) are propping sentiment and provide near‑term buy‑side support. Read More.
• Positive Sentiment: New commercial partnerships — Google announced a Woolworths pilot to add agentic AI to its Olive chatbot in Australia, expanding potential retail use cases and distribution for Google’s AI services. Read More.
• Neutral Sentiment: Competitive positioning — DeepMind leadership and comments that Chinese models are “months” behind support Alphabet’s technical edge, but competition remains intense and will keep investment cycles high. Read More.
• Negative Sentiment: Antitrust fallout — Google asked a judge to defer an order forcing it to share search data while it appeals a ruling that found an illegal monopoly in search; ongoing remedies or eventual enforcement could materially affect the core search business and ad economics. Read More.
• Negative Sentiment: Copyright litigation risk — major publishers are seeking to join a class action alleging Google used copyrighted material to train its AI, creating potential licensing costs, damages or restrictions on training data. Read More.
• Negative Sentiment: Infrastructure headwinds — Google warns U.S. transmission system constraints are slowing data‑center hookups and could raise capex and delay cloud/AI capacity expansion, pressuring near‑term margins. Read More.
• Negative Sentiment: Insider selling — a disclosed director sale (600 shares) is small but adds to mixed sentiment amid other headwinds. Read More.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

GOOGL has been the topic of a number of analyst reports. JMP Securities reiterated a “market outperform” rating and issued a $290.00 price target on shares of Alphabet in a research note on Wednesday, October 22nd. Phillip Securities upgraded shares of Alphabet from a “moderate buy” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Friday, November 7th. Bank of America increased their price target on shares of Alphabet from $335.00 to $370.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, January 13th. Robert W. Baird boosted their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $215.00 to $275.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Monday, September 22nd. Finally, Melius Research increased their target price on Alphabet from $220.00 to $255.00 in a research note on Thursday, September 25th. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, forty-five have assigned a Buy rating and four have assigned a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $326.31.

About Alphabet

Alphabet Inc is the holding company created in 2015 to organize Google and a portfolio of businesses developing technologies beyond Google’s core internet services. Its principal operations are led by Google, which builds and operates consumer-facing products such as Google Search, YouTube, Android, Chrome, Gmail, Google Maps and Google Workspace, as well as advertising platforms (Google Ads and AdSense) that historically generate the majority of its revenue. Google also develops consumer hardware (Pixel phones, Nest smart-home devices, Chromecast) and developer and distribution platforms such as Google Play.

Beyond Google’s consumer and advertising businesses, Alphabet invests in enterprise and infrastructure offerings through Google Cloud, which provides cloud computing, data analytics and productivity services to businesses and institutions.