Centaurus Financial Inc. Increases Position in Alphabet Inc. $GOOGL

Centaurus Financial Inc. grew its position in shares of Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) by 12.0% during the third quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 70,312 shares of the information services provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 7,539 shares during the period. Alphabet makes up about 0.8% of Centaurus Financial Inc.’s holdings, making the stock its 22nd largest holding. Centaurus Financial Inc.’s holdings in Alphabet were worth $17,093,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other institutional investors have also modified their holdings of the company. Brighton Jones LLC grew its position in Alphabet by 3.9% in the 4th quarter. Brighton Jones LLC now owns 110,330 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $20,886,000 after acquiring an additional 4,110 shares in the last quarter. Revolve Wealth Partners LLC lifted its position in shares of Alphabet by 3.5% during the fourth quarter. Revolve Wealth Partners LLC now owns 14,930 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $2,826,000 after purchasing an additional 506 shares in the last quarter. Matrix Asset Advisors Inc. NY lifted its position in shares of Alphabet by 17.6% during the second quarter. Matrix Asset Advisors Inc. NY now owns 3,888 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $685,000 after purchasing an additional 581 shares in the last quarter. Sequoia Financial Advisors LLC boosted its stake in shares of Alphabet by 11.2% in the second quarter. Sequoia Financial Advisors LLC now owns 485,486 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $85,557,000 after purchasing an additional 48,805 shares during the period. Finally, United Bank boosted its stake in shares of Alphabet by 6.9% in the second quarter. United Bank now owns 48,204 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $8,495,000 after purchasing an additional 3,120 shares during the period. 40.03% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Alphabet News Summary

Here are the key news stories impacting Alphabet this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Top AI and strategy hires strengthen DeepMind execution — Jasjeet Sekhon, Bridgewater’s chief scientist, is joining Google’s DeepMind as chief strategy officer, boosting AI talent and strategy depth that supports product leadership and monetization opportunities. Article Title
• Positive Sentiment: Cloud/security M&A expands enterprise angle — Alphabet’s acquisition of Wiz strengthens Google Cloud’s security stack, a key competitive lever vs. AWS/Azure and a driver of higher-margin, enterprise revenue. Article Title
• Positive Sentiment: Defense relationships could open government revenue paths — reporting says Google has rebuilt ties with the Pentagon, which could translate to lucrative contracts if political headwinds remain manageable. Article Title
• Positive Sentiment: AI product momentum pressures rivals — Google’s Stitch redesign (AI → UI generation) is already rattling competitors like Adobe, signaling product strength that could help user growth and ad/cloud adoption. Article Title
• Neutral Sentiment: Regulatory concession may reduce UK friction — Google said it will build search controls allowing sites to opt out of generative-AI features, a move that could blunt UK CMA concerns but may limit feature reach. Article Title
• Neutral Sentiment: Supply-chain / infrastructure sourcing discussions — Google is in talks with Chinese firms for data-center liquid-cooling equipment; could reduce capex cost or invite scrutiny depending on geopolitics. Article Title
• Negative Sentiment: Large planned capex raises near-term margin and valuation questions — Alphabet’s plan to invest up to ~$185B by 2026 and higher AI-driven capex fuels concerns about margin pressure and whether current P/E already prices in that spending. Article Title
• Negative Sentiment: Valuation debate persists despite upbeat fundamentals — analysts remain optimistic, but some write-ups flag Alphabet’s ~25–29x P/E and rising capex as limiting near-term upside vs. expectations. Article Title

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, Director John L. Hennessy sold 1,050 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Monday, March 16th. The stock was sold at an average price of $303.41, for a total value of $318,580.50. Following the transaction, the director owned 4,631 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,405,091.71. This represents a 18.48% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. Also, CEO Sundar Pichai sold 32,500 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, January 7th. The stock was sold at an average price of $321.21, for a total value of $10,439,325.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer directly owned 2,244,372 shares in the company, valued at $720,914,730.12. This trade represents a 1.43% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. In the last 90 days, insiders sold 2,110,165 shares of company stock valued at $118,134,117. 11.64% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Alphabet Price Performance

Shares of GOOGL opened at $307.69 on Thursday. Alphabet Inc. has a twelve month low of $140.53 and a twelve month high of $349.00. The firm’s fifty day simple moving average is $318.54 and its 200-day simple moving average is $291.85. The firm has a market capitalization of $3.72 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 28.46, a PEG ratio of 1.82 and a beta of 1.10. The company has a current ratio of 2.01, a quick ratio of 2.01 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.11.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) last issued its earnings results on Wednesday, February 4th. The information services provider reported $2.82 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.57 by $0.25. The firm had revenue of $113.83 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $111.24 billion. Alphabet had a net margin of 32.81% and a return on equity of 35.01%. Equities analysts forecast that Alphabet Inc. will post 8.9 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Alphabet Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, March 16th. Stockholders of record on Monday, March 9th were given a dividend of $0.21 per share. This represents a $0.84 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.3%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, March 9th. Alphabet’s dividend payout ratio is currently 7.77%.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several equities research analysts recently weighed in on the stock. China Renaissance upped their target price on shares of Alphabet from $330.00 to $400.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, February 6th. Raymond James Financial raised shares of Alphabet from a “moderate buy” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, January 22nd. Evercore reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and set a $400.00 price objective (up from $325.00) on shares of Alphabet in a research report on Thursday, February 5th. Piper Sandler reiterated an “overweight” rating and issued a $395.00 price objective (up from $365.00) on shares of Alphabet in a research note on Thursday, February 5th. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group reiterated a “buy” rating and issued a $375.00 target price (up from $330.00) on shares of Alphabet in a report on Tuesday, January 13th. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, forty-three have assigned a Buy rating and five have given a Hold rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $367.18.

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.