Alphabet Sees Unusually Large Options Volume (NASDAQ:GOOGL)

Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) was the target of some unusual options trading activity on Friday. Stock traders acquired 328,237 call options on the company. This is an increase of approximately 54% compared to the typical volume of 213,740 call options.

Insider Buying and Selling at Alphabet

In other Alphabet news, CAO Amie Thuener O’toole sold 2,835 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, September 10th. The stock was sold at an average price of $151.53, for a total value of $429,587.55. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief accounting officer now owns 29,182 shares in the company, valued at approximately $4,421,948.46. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. In other Alphabet news, CAO Amie Thuener O’toole sold 2,835 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, September 10th. The stock was sold at an average price of $151.53, for a total transaction of $429,587.55. Following the sale, the chief accounting officer now owns 29,182 shares in the company, valued at approximately $4,421,948.46. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. Also, SVP Prabhakar Raghavan sold 3,262 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, July 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $183.99, for a total value of $600,175.38. Following the sale, the senior vice president now owns 9 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,655.91. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last 90 days, insiders sold 179,367 shares of company stock valued at $30,016,931. 11.55% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its holdings in Alphabet by 0.8% in the first quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 497,874,324 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $75,144,172,000 after acquiring an additional 4,064,073 shares during the last quarter. Norges Bank acquired a new position in shares of Alphabet during the fourth quarter worth about $15,441,917,000. Capital Research Global Investors lifted its stake in shares of Alphabet by 14.4% during the first quarter. Capital Research Global Investors now owns 57,803,291 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $8,724,251,000 after purchasing an additional 7,275,757 shares in the last quarter. Bank of New York Mellon Corp lifted its stake in shares of Alphabet by 0.5% during the second quarter. Bank of New York Mellon Corp now owns 49,472,478 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $9,011,412,000 after purchasing an additional 238,403 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Fisher Asset Management LLC lifted its stake in shares of Alphabet by 3.3% during the fourth quarter. Fisher Asset Management LLC now owns 45,178,075 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $6,310,925,000 after purchasing an additional 1,429,261 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 40.03% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of research analysts have recently commented on GOOGL shares. Evercore ISI increased their price objective on Alphabet from $220.00 to $225.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Tuesday, June 11th. Royal Bank of Canada increased their price objective on Alphabet from $200.00 to $204.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, July 24th. Mizuho upped their target price on Alphabet from $205.00 to $210.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, July 24th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upped their target price on Alphabet from $200.00 to $208.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, July 24th. Finally, Wedbush reissued an “outperform” rating and issued a $205.00 target price on shares of Alphabet in a research report on Thursday, September 5th. Eight investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-eight have given a buy rating and two have given a strong buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Alphabet currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $201.76.

Alphabet Stock Performance

NASDAQ GOOGL opened at $157.46 on Friday. Alphabet has a 1-year low of $120.21 and a 1-year high of $191.75. The company has a market capitalization of $1.94 trillion, a P/E ratio of 24.15, a PEG ratio of 1.13 and a beta of 1.04. The business has a 50 day moving average price of $167.46 and a 200 day moving average price of $164.67. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.04, a current ratio of 2.08 and a quick ratio of 2.08.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) last released its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, July 23rd. The information services provider reported $1.89 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.85 by $0.04. The company had revenue of $84.74 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $70.60 billion. Alphabet had a return on equity of 30.49% and a net margin of 26.70%. During the same quarter last year, the business posted $1.44 earnings per share. Sell-side analysts expect that Alphabet will post 7.64 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Alphabet Announces Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, September 16th. Stockholders of record on Monday, September 9th will be issued a dividend of $0.20 per share. This represents a $0.80 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.51%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, September 9th. Alphabet’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 12.27%.

About Alphabet

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.