Investors Buy Large Volume of Call Options on Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL)

Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) saw unusually large options trading on Friday. Investors purchased 392,187 call options on the company. This is an increase of 23% compared to the average volume of 317,596 call options.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

GOOGL has been the topic of several research reports. Raymond James upped their target price on Alphabet from $160.00 to $200.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Friday. Mizuho upped their price target on Alphabet from $170.00 to $190.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday. Jefferies Financial Group upped their price target on Alphabet from $180.00 to $200.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday. KeyCorp upped their price target on Alphabet from $165.00 to $175.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, April 22nd. Finally, Needham & Company LLC upped their price target on Alphabet from $160.00 to $210.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday. Five research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-nine have issued a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $187.82.

Alphabet Trading Up 10.2 %

GOOGL stock opened at $171.95 on Friday. The business has a fifty day moving average price of $147.85 and a 200 day moving average price of $141.42. Alphabet has a fifty-two week low of $103.54 and a fifty-two week high of $174.71. The stock has a market capitalization of $2.14 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 26.37, a P/E/G ratio of 1.43 and a beta of 1.05. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.05, a current ratio of 2.10 and a quick ratio of 2.10.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, January 30th. The information services provider reported $1.64 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.60 by $0.04. The firm had revenue of $86.31 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $70.77 billion. Alphabet had a return on equity of 30.01% and a net margin of 25.90%. During the same period last year, the company earned $1.05 EPS. Analysts expect that Alphabet will post 6.79 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Alphabet Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, June 17th. Shareholders of record on Monday, June 10th will be given a $0.20 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, June 10th. This represents a $0.80 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.47%. Alphabet’s payout ratio is 12.27%.

Insider Transactions at Alphabet

In related news, Director Frances Arnold sold 230 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, January 30th. The stock was sold at an average price of $154.06, for a total transaction of $35,433.80. Following the transaction, the director now directly owns 15,104 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,326,922.24. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. In related news, Director Frances Arnold sold 230 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, January 30th. The stock was sold at an average price of $154.06, for a total transaction of $35,433.80. Following the transaction, the director now directly owns 15,104 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,326,922.24. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. Also, CEO Sundar Pichai sold 22,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, February 7th. The shares were sold at an average price of $146.29, for a total value of $3,291,525.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 2,377,691 shares in the company, valued at $347,832,416.39. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 253,439 shares of company stock valued at $36,746,578 over the last three months. Company insiders own 0.88% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the company. Kellett Wealth Advisors LLC boosted its position in shares of Alphabet by 5.1% in the 1st quarter. Kellett Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 2,688 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $406,000 after purchasing an additional 130 shares during the last quarter. Phoenix Wealth Advisors boosted its position in shares of Alphabet by 4.5% in the 1st quarter. Phoenix Wealth Advisors now owns 2,785 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $420,000 after purchasing an additional 120 shares during the last quarter. Fonville Wealth Management LLC boosted its position in shares of Alphabet by 6.7% in the 1st quarter. Fonville Wealth Management LLC now owns 1,598 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $241,000 after purchasing an additional 100 shares during the last quarter. Finer Wealth Management Inc. boosted its position in shares of Alphabet by 4.0% in the 1st quarter. Finer Wealth Management Inc. now owns 36,365 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $5,489,000 after purchasing an additional 1,396 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Foster Victor Wealth Advisors LLC boosted its position in shares of Alphabet by 4.8% in the 1st quarter. Foster Victor Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 132,521 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $21,125,000 after purchasing an additional 6,082 shares during the last quarter. 40.03% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Alphabet Company Profile

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.