Alphabet Inc. $GOOGL Shares Sold by Board of Trustees of The Leland Stanford Junior University

Board of Trustees of The Leland Stanford Junior University decreased its holdings in shares of Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) by 44.1% during the third quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The fund owned 784,750 shares of the information services provider’s stock after selling 618,771 shares during the period. Alphabet makes up approximately 22.4% of Board of Trustees of The Leland Stanford Junior University’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 2nd largest holding. Board of Trustees of The Leland Stanford Junior University’s holdings in Alphabet were worth $190,773,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently modified their holdings of the company. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its stake in Alphabet by 1.3% in the 2nd quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 516,559,609 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $91,033,300,000 after acquiring an additional 6,733,278 shares during the last quarter. State Street Corp grew its stake in Alphabet by 1.8% during the 2nd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 229,954,269 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $40,524,841,000 after purchasing an additional 4,008,374 shares during the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC increased its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 3.1% in the second quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 141,615,284 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $24,857,017,000 after purchasing an additional 4,224,497 shares during the period. Norges Bank acquired a new position in shares of Alphabet in the second quarter valued at about $21,944,208,000. Finally, Invesco Ltd. raised its stake in shares of Alphabet by 1.2% in the second quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 44,151,820 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $7,780,875,000 after purchasing an additional 503,306 shares during the last quarter. 40.03% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several equities analysts recently weighed in on GOOGL shares. Stifel Nicolaus reiterated a “buy” rating and issued a $395.00 price target (up previously from $346.00) on shares of Alphabet in a report on Thursday, February 5th. Sanford C. Bernstein increased their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $305.00 to $335.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a research note on Monday, February 2nd. KeyCorp set a $370.00 target price on shares of Alphabet and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Thursday, February 5th. New Street Research upped their price target on shares of Alphabet from $330.00 to $380.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, February 10th. Finally, Royal Bank Of Canada lifted their price objective on Alphabet from $375.00 to $400.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, February 5th. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, forty-three have issued a Buy rating and five have issued a Hold rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $363.10.

Insider Activity at Alphabet

In other news, Director John L. Hennessy sold 600 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, February 13th. The stock was sold at an average price of $306.73, for a total value of $184,038.00. Following the transaction, the director owned 20,624 shares in the company, valued at $6,325,999.52. This trade represents a 2.83% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Also, CAO Amie Thuener O’toole sold 933 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, February 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $336.55, for a total value of $314,001.15. Following the sale, the chief accounting officer owned 9,916 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $3,337,229.80. The trade was a 8.60% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. Insiders sold 2,032,408 shares of company stock worth $94,926,707 in the last quarter. Corporate insiders own 11.64% of the company’s stock.

Trending Headlines about Alphabet

Here are the key news stories impacting Alphabet this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Berkshire Hathaway kept its Alphabet stake while cutting Amazon — a high-profile endorsement of Alphabet’s cloud/AI strategy that investors view as a vote of confidence. Read More.
• Positive Sentiment: Strategic demand signal: India’s Adani Group plans a massive AI data-center investment with Google and others, implying future hyperscaler cloud demand in a large growth market. Read More.
• Positive Sentiment: Product roadmap: Google I/O set for May (expectations for AI glasses and other AI-driven consumer launches) provides a visible catalyst for new product monetization. Read More.
• Positive Sentiment: Operational/ESG tailwind: a long-term geothermal PPA will supply Google’s Nevada operations, supporting data-center resilience and sustainability goals. Read More.
• Neutral Sentiment: Waymo oversight: Waymo defended its use of remote-assistance workers to Congress, which clarifies operations but leaves regulatory attention intact. Read More.
• Neutral Sentiment: Product refresh: Google introduced the $499 Pixel 10a with AI features — positive for device ecosystem but modest near-term revenue impact versus cloud/ads. Read More.
• Neutral Sentiment: Insider activity: Director John Hennessy sold 600 shares (small dollar amount relative to market cap) — noted by the market but not a material red flag. Read More.
• Negative Sentiment: High-profile trimming: Terry Smith (Fundsmith) reportedly cut about half of his Alphabet position — a headline that can create short-term selling pressure or signal rotation. Read More.
• Negative Sentiment: Macro/strategy risk: Analysts and coverage flag near-term pullback due to Alphabet’s elevated AI/compute CapEx and broader megacap rotation; some pieces call the stock in correction territory. Read More.
• Negative Sentiment: Service reliability: a recent YouTube outage (tens of thousands affected) briefly tests trust in Google’s consumer platforms and could draw short-term media attention. Read More.

Alphabet Trading Up 0.4%

Shares of NASDAQ:GOOGL opened at $303.33 on Thursday. The business’s 50 day moving average price is $320.40 and its 200-day moving average price is $277.29. Alphabet Inc. has a 1 year low of $140.53 and a 1 year high of $349.00. The firm has a market capitalization of $3.67 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 28.06, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.77 and a beta of 1.09. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.11, a current ratio of 2.01 and a quick ratio of 2.01.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, February 4th. The information services provider reported $2.82 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.57 by $0.25. The company had revenue of $113.83 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $111.24 billion. Alphabet had a net margin of 32.81% and a return on equity of 35.01%. On average, equities research analysts forecast that Alphabet Inc. will post 8.9 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Alphabet Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, March 16th. Investors of record on Monday, March 9th will be issued a $0.21 dividend. This represents a $0.84 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.3%. The ex-dividend date is Monday, March 9th. Alphabet’s payout ratio is presently 7.77%.

Alphabet Profile

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.