Alphabet IncGOOGTOP PICKFeb 24, 2025Stock 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.
It is the largest player in the search business and has several other businesses such as YouTube and a self-driving division. In digital advertising it has 30% of a $400 billion market which is continually growing. Its monetization of advertising doesn't get enough credit. It is a big spender on the cloud and AI. It has tons of free cash flow and no debt giving it one of the best balance sheets in the world. It is trading at 20X which is less than the market, is undervalued, and can continue to grow in the double digits for the next several years. Buy 19 Hold 1 Sell 0
(Analysts’ price target is $221.75)