Violich Capital Management Inc. Sells 32,020 Shares of Alphabet Inc. $GOOG

Violich Capital Management Inc. lowered its holdings in shares of Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) by 8.9% during the second quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The institutional investor owned 329,553 shares of the information services provider’s stock after selling 32,020 shares during the quarter. Alphabet comprises about 8.2% of Violich Capital Management Inc.’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 2nd biggest position. Violich Capital Management Inc.’s holdings in Alphabet were worth $58,459,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other institutional investors have also recently bought and sold shares of the business. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its stake in Alphabet by 2.4% during the first quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 411,570,922 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $64,299,725,000 after buying an additional 9,687,855 shares in the last quarter. Kingstone Capital Partners Texas LLC boosted its stake in Alphabet by 580,897.4% during the second quarter. Kingstone Capital Partners Texas LLC now owns 135,087,705 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $23,963,208,000 after buying an additional 135,064,454 shares in the last quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted its stake in Alphabet by 9.9% during the first quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 102,232,997 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $15,971,861,000 after buying an additional 9,243,959 shares in the last quarter. Deutsche Bank AG boosted its stake in Alphabet by 5.4% during the first quarter. Deutsche Bank AG now owns 21,345,784 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $3,334,852,000 after buying an additional 1,098,996 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Invesco Ltd. boosted its stake in Alphabet by 2.2% during the first quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 20,380,073 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $3,183,979,000 after buying an additional 440,526 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 27.26% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of research firms have weighed in on GOOG. KeyCorp set a $265.00 price target on shares of Alphabet in a research note on Wednesday, September 3rd. Morgan Stanley boosted their target price on shares of Alphabet from $210.00 to $270.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 2nd. UBS Group set a $255.00 target price on shares of Alphabet and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 9th. Jefferies Financial Group boosted their target price on shares of Alphabet from $230.00 to $285.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 2nd. Finally, Robert W. Baird boosted their target price on shares of Alphabet from $215.00 to $275.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Monday, September 22nd. Six equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-one have issued a Buy rating, five have issued a Hold rating and three have issued a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $246.26.

Insider Activity

In other Alphabet news, CEO Sundar Pichai sold 32,500 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, October 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $250.15, for a total transaction of $8,129,875.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer directly owned 2,369,619 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $592,760,192.85. The trade was a 1.35% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, insider John Kent Walker sold 17,816 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, September 29th. The stock was sold at an average price of $247.42, for a total value of $4,408,034.72. Following the sale, the insider directly owned 42,985 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $10,635,348.70. This represents a 29.30% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last three months, insiders sold 246,150 shares of company stock worth $55,805,379. Corporate insiders own 12.99% of the company’s stock.

Alphabet Stock Down 2.2%

Shares of NASDAQ GOOG opened at $251.34 on Wednesday. The firm’s 50-day simple moving average is $234.23 and its 200 day simple moving average is $194.41. The company has a market cap of $3.04 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 26.77, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.74 and a beta of 1.00. The company has a quick ratio of 1.90, a current ratio of 1.90 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.07. Alphabet Inc. has a 12-month low of $142.66 and a 12-month high of $257.88.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOG) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, July 23rd. The information services provider reported $2.31 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.12 by $0.19. The business had revenue of $96.43 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $93.67 billion. Alphabet had a net margin of 31.12% and a return on equity of 34.31%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 13.8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company earned $1.89 EPS. On average, research analysts expect that Alphabet Inc. will post 8.89 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

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.