Skylands Capital LLC Has $28.75 Million Holdings in Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL)

Skylands Capital LLC boosted its stake in shares of Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) by 19.6% during the 1st quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 185,885 shares of the information services provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 30,460 shares during the period. Alphabet comprises about 4.1% of Skylands Capital LLC’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 3rd biggest position. Skylands Capital LLC’s holdings in Alphabet were worth $28,745,000 as of its most recent filing with the SEC.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Rockbridge Capital Management LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Alphabet in the fourth quarter worth $3,119,000. Optivise Advisory Services LLC increased its stake in shares of Alphabet by 8.0% in the fourth quarter. Optivise Advisory Services LLC now owns 5,464 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $1,035,000 after purchasing an additional 403 shares in the last quarter. Community Bank N.A. increased its stake in shares of Alphabet by 6.4% in the fourth quarter. Community Bank N.A. now owns 46,173 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $8,741,000 after purchasing an additional 2,790 shares in the last quarter. Falcon Wealth Planning boosted its stake in shares of Alphabet by 15.7% in the first quarter. Falcon Wealth Planning now owns 9,898 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $1,531,000 after acquiring an additional 1,340 shares during the period. Finally, Premier Fund Managers Ltd boosted its stake in shares of Alphabet by 30.0% in the fourth quarter. Premier Fund Managers Ltd now owns 61,792 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $11,816,000 after acquiring an additional 14,262 shares during the period. 40.03% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Insider Activity

In other news, Director John L. Hennessy sold 600 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, May 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $175.00, for a total transaction of $105,000.00. Following the transaction, the director owned 6,813 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,192,275. This represents a 8.09% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. Also, CEO Sundar Pichai sold 32,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, May 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $170.87, for a total value of $5,553,275.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer directly owned 2,620,196 shares in the company, valued at approximately $447,712,890.52. This represents a 1.23% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last 90 days, insiders have sold 215,643 shares of company stock valued at $36,330,928. 11.64% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of equities analysts have recently weighed in on GOOGL shares. Susquehanna dropped their price objective on Alphabet from $225.00 to $220.00 and set a “positive” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, April 25th. BMO Capital Markets reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and issued a $200.00 price objective (down previously from $230.00) on shares of Alphabet in a research note on Thursday, April 17th. Mizuho dropped their price objective on Alphabet from $230.00 to $205.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, April 9th. Jefferies Financial Group dropped their price objective on Alphabet from $235.00 to $200.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, March 31st. Finally, Morgan Stanley dropped their price objective on Alphabet from $210.00 to $185.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, April 17th. Ten research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-eight have assigned a buy rating and four have issued a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $199.95.

Alphabet Trading Up 0.2%

Shares of GOOGL stock opened at $179.08 on Friday. The company has a market cap of $2.17 trillion, a PE ratio of 19.96, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.26 and a beta of 1.00. The stock’s 50 day simple moving average is $168.70 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $173.97. Alphabet Inc. has a 1 year low of $140.53 and a 1 year high of $207.05. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.03, a current ratio of 1.77 and a quick ratio of 1.77.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) last released its earnings results on Thursday, April 24th. The information services provider reported $2.81 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.02 by $0.79. The firm had revenue of $76.49 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $89.30 billion. Alphabet had a return on equity of 34.54% and a net margin of 30.86%. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm posted $1.89 earnings per share. Research analysts predict that Alphabet Inc. will post 8.9 earnings per share for the current year.

Alphabet Increases Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, June 16th. Stockholders of record on Monday, June 9th were paid a dividend of $0.21 per share. This is a boost from Alphabet’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.20. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, June 9th. This represents a $0.84 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.47%. Alphabet’s dividend payout ratio is currently 9.36%.

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.