Alphabet IncGOOGTOP PICKFeb 24, 2016Stock price when the opinion was issued
As of Jul 10, 2026. Market Open.
Fears that AI would eat its lunch. Harder for Anthropic to monetize a new tool than for GOOG to take AI and apply it to a business model that it already monetizes. Muscle memory of the populace gravitates to GOOG to find information. Probably thrives in the new AI world, until something more disruptive comes along.
AI monetization is happening, and AI Mode has been a game changer. Stronger cloud growth (revenue grew 63% YOY last quarter, tremendous), broader monetization across platforms. Search and advertising remain strong, lots of cashflow. Also a great ecosystem.
Good growth, but relatively decent valuation. Yield is 0.25%.
A year ago, consensus was that Search was going to die. Seems ridiculous now. Gemini is overtaking ChatGPT. Data centre business is growing faster than before. Still not that expensive. He hasn't sold any shares yet, but may take some off the table from the long-term holding and put toward one of the Mag 7 laggards.
Valuation looks very attractive relative to other growth oriented technology companies. Trading at 21X forward earnings with a 16% long-term growth rate. Has a 1.3X PEG ratio, which is very cheap in the S&P 500. They control 73% of the search engine space in the US, and over 50% of the global search ad revenue. Those things are going to grow organically. The new CFO is doing a lot of great things to help with transparency. Down 9%-10% year to date, which is a pretty good buying opportunity.