SummaryAlphabet reported strong Q2 results, with 24% YoY revenue growth and a 300% YoY net income surge.Despite a post-earnings sell-off driven by rising AI CapEx and negative free cash flow, I view this as a buying opportunity.GOOGL's aggressive AI and cloud investments are strategic loss leaders, deepening user entrenchment and expanding its moat.I maintain a bullish buy rating, seeing the CapEx-driven dip as temporary and supportive of long-term value creation. Heather Diehl/Getty Images News
Alphabet (GOOG/GOOGL) reported its Q2 earnings on July 22, and the market sold it off, largely on the headline that its AI capex spending (which commentators and investors have been bemoaning about the ROI
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Technologická konglomerát Alphabet zveřejnil výsledky hospodaření za druhý kvartál roku 2026. Trhy zaujaly především výsledky Google Cloud, jehož výnosy meziročně vzrostly o 82 %. Nicméně rostoucí poptávka po cloudových službách a umělé inteligenci má za následek růst kapitálových výdajů, které jsou v tomto roce projektovány v rozmezí 195-205 mld. USD. Volné hotovostní toky poprvé v historii dosáhly záporných hodnot, a to 5,9 mld. USD.
Výsledky společnosti Alphabet (GOOGL) za 2Q 2026 2Q 2026 Konsensus 2Q 2026 2Q 2025 Výnosy (mld. USD) 119,8 117,02 96,43 Čistý zisk (mld. USD) 112,11 -- 28,20 Zisk na akcii (EPS, USD/akcie) 2,75* 2,90 2,31 *Zisk na akcii je očištěn především o jednorázové vlivy z přecenění investic Alphabetu do společností Anthropic a SpaceX.
Výsledky za 2Q Výnosy společnosti meziročně vzrostly o 24 % nebo o 23 % na konstantní měnové bázi na 112,11 mld. USD. Při očištění výnosů od Traffic Acquisition Costs - TAC (náklady na získání návštěvnosti) dosáhl Alphabet výnosů ve výši 103,62 mld. USD (meziroční růst o 27 %), přičemž analytický konsensus byl na úrovni 101,07 mld. USD.
Provozní zisk zaznamenal meziroční růst o 30 % na 40,77 mld. USD při očekávání analytiků 40,55 mld. USD. Provozní marže meziročně vzrostla o 2,0 p. b. na 34,0 % při očekávání 34,7 %.
Počet zaměstnanců vzrostl v meziročním srovnání o 6,3 % na 198,9 tis. Analytici v průměru predikovali 195,53 tis.
Výnosy Alphabetu ve 3Q dle segmentu
(mld. USD) Segment Výnosy Konsenzus Meziroční změna Google Advertising (Výnosy plynoucí z reklamy) 81,63 81,12 +14 % Vyhledávač Google & ostatní
63,27 63,28 +17 % YouTube reklamy 11,06 10,81 +13 % Google Network (AdMob, AdSense,..)
7,30 7,13 -0,7 % Google Subscriptions, Platforms, and Devices (Google Play, Fitbit, Google Nest, Google Pixel, YT Premium,..) 12,91 13,06 +15 % Google Cloud (Google Cloud Platform, Google Workspace,..) 24,77 22,46 +82 % Other Bets (Ostatní sázky - Waymo, Verily, GFiber,..) 0,38 0,40 +2,4 % Počet zaměstnanců vzrostl v meziročním srovnání o 6,3 % na 198,9 tis. Analytici v průměru predikovali 195,53 tis.
Zisk společnosti byl reportován ve výši 9,11 USD, jež byl pozitivně ovlivněn přeceněním investic do společností Anthropic, SpaceX ve výši 99,0 mld. USD, což navýšilo čistý zisk o 77,1 mld. USD, respektive o 6,26 USD na akcii.
Google Cloud, kapitálové výdaje (CAPEX) a jejich vliv na Free cash flow Google Cloud zaznamenal meziroční růst výnosů o 82 % na 24,77 mld. USD. Tržní konsensus byl nastaven na 22,46 mld. USD. Provozní zisk v tomto segmentu dosáhl 8,81 mld. USD. Ve stejném období činil 2,83 mld. USD. Analytici jej v průměru predikovali ve výši 6,91 mld. USD.
Nezpracované zakázky (backlog) v Google Cloud dosáhly 514 mld. USD, což indikuje mezikvartální nárůst o více než 11,7 %.
S rostoucí poptávkou po cloudu se zvyšují kapitálové výdaje společnosti, které v uplynulém kvartálu dosáhly 44,92 mld. USD. Ve stejném období činily 22,45 mld. USD. Analytici v průměru predikovali 44,15 mld. USD. Přibližně 60 % z těchto výdajů byly vynaloženy na servery společnosti, 40 % na datacentra a síťovou infrastrukturu.
Společnost také přistoupila k opětovnému zvýšení kapitálových výdajů, a to na 195-205 mld. USD z původních 180-190 mld. USD. Alphabet tento krok odůvodnil zrychlením dodávek kapacity kvůli poptávce. V následujícím roce společnost nadále očekává výrazný nárůst kapitálových výdajů, projektované hodnoty zatím Alphabet nezveřejnil.
Růst kapitálových výdajů má negativní vliv na volné hotovostní toky společnosti (Free cash flow). Poprvé v historii se hotovostní toky propadly do červených čísel, když dosáhly -5,9 mld. USD. Společnost v uplynulém kvartálu zpětně neodkoupila akcie, naopak přistoupila k navýšení kapitálu z emise akcií (včetně povinně konvertibilních prioritních akcií) o přibližně 49,6 mld. USD.
Komentář CEO „Naše investice do umělé inteligence mění možnosti napříč celým naším podnikáním.
Druhé čtvrtletí bylo mimořádně úspěšné. Tržby společnosti Alphabet meziročně vzrostly o 24 % a tržby divize Google Cloud zrychlily růst na 82 %, a to díky silné poptávce po AI infrastruktuře a řešeních založených na umělé inteligenci. Těší nás široké rozšíření služby Gemini Enterprise, kterou dnes využívá téměř 90 % společností z žebříčku Fortune 100.
Pozitivní dynamiku sledujeme napříč celou společností. Naše populární AI funkce podporují růst počtu vyhledávacích dotazů. Modely Gemini nyní zpracovávají 22 miliard API tokenů za minutu a aplikace Gemini má 950 milionů měsíčně aktivních uživatelů. Silnou poptávku zaznamenáváme také po našich bezpečnostních řešeních a nový model Gemini 3.5 Flash Cyber nabízí špičkový výkon v oblasti kybernetické bezpečnosti při velmi vysoké nákladové efektivitě. Platforma YouTube navíc zůstává hlavním místem pro sledování významných světových událostí. Během mistrovství světa ve fotbale FIFA 2026 sledovalo videa související s turnajem více než 1,7 miliardy unikátních diváků, uvedl Sundar Pichai, CEO společnosti Alphabet.
Komentář analytiků Analytik z EverCore ISI uvedl, že Google navzdory vysokým očekáváním většinu z nich splnil. Za největší překvapení označil výsledky divize Google Cloud, která vykázala meziroční růst tržeb o 82 % a rekordní provozní marži 36 %.
Analytik z Barclays komentoval výsledky takto: „Náklady na integraci umělé inteligence do všech služeb společnosti, trénování modelů a obsluhu zákazníků Google Cloud vedou k prudkému růstu provozních i kapitálových výdajů, což v krátkodobém horizontu vytváří tlak na marže.“
Akcie Alphabet Akcie společnosti Alphabet (GOOGL) před začátkem obchodování oslabují o 4,21 % na 327,7 USD.
Akcie Alphabet Inc (GOOGL) včera uzavřely poklesem o 1,5 % na 342,09 USD Ukazatel Ukazatel Kapitalizace (mld. USD) 4163,7 P/E 33,1 Vývoj za letošní rok (%) +9,3 Očekávané P/E 23,0 52týdenní minimum (USD) 187,8 Prům. cílová cena (USD) 432,0 52týdenní maximum (USD) 408,6 Dividendový výnos (%) 0,2 Zdroj: Bloomberg, Alphabet
Obchodování na hlavních evropských akciových trzích je dopoledne více či méně negativní. Index DAX ztrácí 0,7 %, CAC40 je dole o procento, AEX klesá o 0,3 % a londýnský FTSE100 mírně ustupuje o 0,1 procenta.
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23.07.2026 11:58Na akcie doléhá příliš drahá AI, rostoucí výnosy dluhopisů i výsledky 11:00Alphabet poprvé od svého IPO vykazuje záporný cash flow. Akcie i přes famózní výsledky klesají 10:38UniCredit ve druhém čtvrtletí klesl zisk o 13 procent 9:21Rozbřesk: Jak Detroit prohrál s Japonskem a proč by Evropa měla zbystřit 8:36Výsledky dodaly Alphabet a Tesla, Evropa zahájí spíše negativně 8:26Prodej aut v EU v červnu stoupl o 13,6 procenta, dál posílili čínští výrobci 8:19Muskova automobilka Tesla zvýšila tržby o čtvrtinu, ale zisk jí klesl 22.07.2026 22:39Alphabet překonal odhady. Poptávka po AI je enormní, cloud vykázal více než 80procentní růst 22:01Akcie před výsledky technologických gigantů kolísaly, růst ropy zvýšil obavy z inflace 18:10Stát by mohl dát na burzu až 40 procent akcií pražského letiště v roce 2028, řekl Babiš 18:05A komu tím prospějete? 16:59Šéf Equinoru: EU zřejmě nesplní cíl pro naplnění zásobníků plynu před zimou 16:40Prezident Pavel vetoval spornou novelu rozpočtových zákonů 16:28Alphabet čeká klíčová zkouška. Investoři chtějí vidět návratnost investic do AI 16:27AMD investuje do firmy Anthropic až pět miliard dolarů, Antropic od AMD koupí čipy 15:01Moneta by měla pokračovat v růstu. Klíčovým tématem bude kapitál a výplata akcionářům 13:29Autonomní agent AI se při bezpečnostním testu vymkl kontrole, uvedla OpenAI 13:15Za Starmera vedl obranu, nyní bude Healey šéfem britské státní kasy. Investoři tak sází na vyšší výdaje na obranu 11:40Goldman Sachs hledá příležitosti mimo AI. Sází na spotřebu, finance i cestování 11:10Zatímco se čeká na Google, ropa poskočila výš a opatrnost se vrací
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Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:GOOG) shares fell almost 3% after hours, wiping almost $125 billion from its valuation, despite second-quarter results that beat Wall Street forecasts on both revenue and earnings.
The Google parent reported revenue of $119.8 billion and earnings per share of $9.11, against analyst expectations of $116.9 billion.
Google Cloud revenue rose 82% year on year to $24.77 billion, and remaining performance obligations, the value of contracts signed but not yet delivered, reached $514 billion against a forecast $488.1 billion.
The share price reaction points to the number investors actually cared about.
Capital expenditure hit $44.9 billion in the quarter, double the same period last year, keeping Alphabet on track for full-year spending of $180 billion to $190 billion.
Free cash flow fell roughly 47% year on year in the first quarter to $10.1 billion, and chief financial officer Anat Ashkenazi has already told investors 2027 spending will increase significantly again.
The stock has dropped in each of the past three months and sits below its 52-week high, behind Apple and Nvidia for the year despite an 11% gain.
Adding to the unease, Bloomberg reported Google has delayed its Gemini 3.5 Pro model over concerns about how it compares with rivals, a claim the company disputes.
The click that never comes
Beneath the quarterly numbers sits a structural problem that no earnings beat resolves.
Google's advertising business, which delivered $81.63 billion this quarter, depends on an open web of publishers producing the content its search results index and monetise.
That web is contracting.
Ahrefs data published in February found AI Overviews, the AI-generated summaries Google places above search results, cut click-through rates for the top-ranked link by 58%, nearly double the figure measured eight months earlier.
Roughly 83% of searches featuring an AI Overview end without a click to any website.
The consequences are already visible: Business Insider lost 55% of its organic traffic and cut 21% of staff, CNN saw traffic fall about 30% year on year, and DMG Media, owner of MailOnline, reported click-through declines of up to 89% on affected queries.
Gartner forecasts that half or more of organic search traffic to websites will disappear by 2028.
Eating the goose
The logic is uncomfortable for Alphabet. Search advertising works because users click through to pages carrying more advertising, much of it also sold by Google.
If publishers close, the corpus of fresh, reliable content that makes AI Overviews useful thins out, and the inventory Google monetises across the wider web shrinks with it.
Advertisers then concentrate spending inside the walled gardens, which flatters Google in the short term and narrows the ecosystem it depends on over the longer term.
Wall Street has so far treated this as someone else's problem, focusing instead on cloud growth and capex discipline.
That is unlikely to hold indefinitely. The moment search revenue growth decelerates while capital spending keeps climbing, the two stories converge, and investors will be asked to value a business that has consumed part of its own supply chain.
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Shares of Alphabet and Tesla fell in premarket trading on Thursday after both firms signalled increased AI spending, unnerving investors worried about the mounting costs of the artificial intelligence boom.
Alphabet shares were around 4% lower, while Tesla's stock fell over 5% in premarket trading.
Alphabet and Tesla shares this year.
Both companies reported negative free cash flow for the second quarter on Wednesday. Alphabet raised its capital expenditure forecast for this year to $195 billion to $205 billion and warned of higher figures in 2027. The Google parent company's previous projection was for capex between $180 billion and $190 billion.
Tesla, meanwhile said capex surged 142% year-on-year in the second quarter to $5.79 billion. The company said it expects more than $25 billion in capex this year.
Management at both companies looked to calm investor fears over spending.
"This is a massive capex year. I'm confident that all the things that we're investing in will yield incredible returns. Really, maybe the best capex returns that we've ever seen," Tesla CEO Elon Musk said on the earnings call on Wednesday.
watch now
Musk talked up the company's future initiatives around semiconductor production and Optimus, Tesla's humanoid robot, as it highlighted where the spending was going. Tesla is "installing the first-generation lines for Optimus," and will "start production soon," the company said in its earnings presentation.
Alphabet's CEO said the spending increase "is primarily due to an acceleration in the delivery of capacity to meet growing demand." The tech giant has maintained that it does not have enough computing capacity to meet the AI demand that it is seeing.
Spending figures at both companies offset some bright spots.
There were signs that some of Google's investments were beginning to pay off. Google's cloud revenue jumped 82% to $24.8 billion, beating forecasts.
At Tesla, the company's core automotive business brought in $20.52 billion in revenue, up 23% year-on-year.
Read more
— CNBC's Lora Kolodny and MacKenzie Sigalos contributed to this report.
In the July 22 after-hours session, immediately after filing second-quarter (Q2) earnings, Google (NASDAQ: GOOGL) stock plummeted 3.31% from its close at $342.09 to $330.76, effectively wiping $138 billion from Alphabet’s market capitalization.
Google stock price one-day chart. Source: Google At face value, the downward move appears odd given that the blue-chip chipmaker unveiled a massive revenue beat, revealing its sales were $119.80 billion when $116.93 billion was expected.
However, already the other most-cited metric following quarterly filings – earnings per share (EPS) – offers a hint into the reason for the crash. Indeed, Google’s Q2 EPS proved lower than the expected $2.89, at $2.85.
Google CapEx to soar to $200 amid rising AI profitability concerns Additionally and perhaps most damningly from the point of view of shareholders, Alphabet has revised its capital expenditure (CapEx) expectations from the range between $180 billion and $190 billion from the previous quarter to a staggering $195 billion to $205 billion.
The move follows growing discomfort over investments in artificial intelligence (AI) as, despite the reported progress from various involved firms, there remains a general lack of clear evidence that adoption is unambiguously beneficial – especially following the 2026 trend of increasing usage prices, arguably in an effort to stop subsidizing customers.
Google’s CapEx is, in particular, controversial as the company made its first equity offer in decades in June, signalling its profits – or creditors – are no longer able to support expenditure fully.
Additional evidence backing the concern can be found in the fact that Google’s free cash flow dropped to a negative $5.9 billion for the first time in over a decade.
Meanwhile, July also brought rising competition from cheaper Chinese models, which appear to be perceived as a sufficient threat that multiple AI companies now seem to be calling for tighter regulation.
Notably, these firms have previously been against such constraints to a sufficient degree that the Federal Government made attempts to ban States from implementing their own regulation.
Google laments supply constraints, plans to lease external AI compute Finally, Alphabet also reiterated its previous point about constraints presented by insufficient capacity supply, signalling it would seek external compute and warning the new approach could have a temporary negative impact on margins.
Google recently entered an agreement with Elon Musk’s newer public company, SpaceX (NASDAQ: SPCX), to lease some of its data centers along with Anthropic and might be able to find additional external capacity with Meta Platforms (NASDAQ: META).
By press time, the actual availability of compute across the industry remains as unclear as the actual revenue and profitability from AI on account of comparatively little available information on completion of data centers relative to press releases on new planned facilities.
Featured image via Shutterstock
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Alphabet (Investiční tipy) má za sebou čtvrtletí, které by za normálních okolností vypadalo jako jasné vítězství. Tržby překonaly očekávání, cloud prudce zrychlil, zisk na akcii výrazně předčil odhady a využívání nástrojů umělé inteligence dál roste.
Pokračování článku je dostupné jen klientům placených služeb Patria Plus / Investor Plus případně uživatelům platformy Patria Direct. Pokud jste klientem těchto služeb, potom je nutné se Přihlásit.
V rámci placeného informačního servisu získáte přístup ke kompletnímu zpravodajství www.patria.cz bez jakýchkoliv omezení. Veškeré zprávy, komentáře a horké zprávy jsou zobrazovány terminálovou metodou (bez nutnosti obnovovat stránku) bez zpoždění a v plné verzi.
Nejen zpravodajství, ale i další služby získáte v Patria Plus / Investor Plus - sms a e-mailové zpravodajství, data z finančních trhů v reálném čase, kompletní analytický servis, rozsáhlé databáze časových řad ke stažení, prognózy vývoje a valuace, ekonomické fundamenty, nástroje a kalkulátory... více
Tagy: Google, akcie, Alphabet, umělá inteligence, cloud, AI, hospodářské výsledky, cash flow
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23.07.2026 11:00Alphabet poprvé od svého IPO vykazuje záporný cash flow. Akcie i přes famózní výsledky klesají 10:38UniCredit ve druhém čtvrtletí klesl zisk o 13 procent 9:21Rozbřesk: Jak Detroit prohrál s Japonskem a proč by Evropa měla zbystřit 8:36Výsledky dodaly Alphabet a Tesla, Evropa zahájí spíše negativně 8:26Prodej aut v EU v červnu stoupl o 13,6 procenta, dál posílili čínští výrobci 8:19Muskova automobilka Tesla zvýšila tržby o čtvrtinu, ale zisk jí klesl 22.07.2026 22:39Alphabet překonal odhady. Poptávka po AI je enormní, cloud vykázal více než 80procentní růst 22:01Akcie před výsledky technologických gigantů kolísaly, růst ropy zvýšil obavy z inflace 18:10Stát by mohl dát na burzu až 40 procent akcií pražského letiště v roce 2028, řekl Babiš 18:05A komu tím prospějete? 16:59Šéf Equinoru: EU zřejmě nesplní cíl pro naplnění zásobníků plynu před zimou 16:40Prezident Pavel vetoval spornou novelu rozpočtových zákonů 16:28Alphabet čeká klíčová zkouška. Investoři chtějí vidět návratnost investic do AI 16:27AMD investuje do firmy Anthropic až pět miliard dolarů, Antropic od AMD koupí čipy 15:01Moneta by měla pokračovat v růstu. Klíčovým tématem bude kapitál a výplata akcionářům 13:29Autonomní agent AI se při bezpečnostním testu vymkl kontrole, uvedla OpenAI 13:15Za Starmera vedl obranu, nyní bude Healey šéfem britské státní kasy. Investoři tak sází na vyšší výdaje na obranu 11:40Goldman Sachs hledá příležitosti mimo AI. Sází na spotřebu, finance i cestování 11:10Zatímco se čeká na Google, ropa poskočila výš a opatrnost se vrací 8:56Rozbřesk: O neudržitelnosti nízkých cen potravin v ČR
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Evropské akcie budou dle futures kontraktů ve čtvrtek ráno otvírat se ztrátami do -0,5 %, zatímco zámoří aktuálně ztrácí -0,2 %. Investoři sledují ceny ropy, Brent se obchoduje na 96 USD a je tak nejvýše od přelomu květen/červen. Na Blízkém východě pokračuje napětí, tankery v Rudém moři jsou terčem Íránem podporovaných Hútíjů. Diplomatické úsilí o ukončení konfliktu se tak fakticky zastavilo a růst cen energií zatěžuje vyhlídky na inflaci. V prodlouženém obchodování v USA včera klesly akcie Alphabet (-3 %), když investoři vyjádřili obavy z vyšších kapitálových výdajů příští rok (cca +15 mld. USD proti odhadům). Po výsledcích se nedařilo ani akciím Tesla. Na druhou stranu vyšší výdaje vyhovují např. čipovým firmám, Asie tak těžila z růstu Samsungu či SK Hynix. V Evropě dnes zasedá ECB, pohyb sazeb se nečeká, trh však čeká pohyb vzhůru na zářijovém zasedání. Kvartální výsledky bank BNP či Unicredit vypadají silně. Praha po včerejším růstu (PX +1,5 %) by mohla spíše předvést smíšený vývoj. Vybírání zisků by mohlo převažovat na bankách.
Sundar Pichai said AI-powered tools are driving Google searches. Sergei GAPON / AFP via Getty Images Google says its search function is not dead, it's thriving.
In a Wednesday earnings call, Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai said Google's AI-powered features, such as AI Overviews and AI mode, were driving growth in search queries.
Pichai said he saw this in full effect during the FIFA World Cup that started in June and wrapped up on Sunday.
"As a big football fan, I was particularly excited to see search usage hit an all-time high during the World Cup this year," he said. "This really highlights how much people turn to Google in moments that matter."
He said Google's AI-powered search function, AI Mode, has surpassed a billion monthly active users since it was expanded globally last October. The tool is driving an "incremental increase in search queries overall," and is allowing Google to "send billions of clicks to websites every week through AI features in Search," he said.
Pichai added during the earnings call that Google saw 17% revenue growth in search driven by these tools, and that the company will continue to make search more "helpful and intuitive."
Search is one of Google's largest cash cows. It was the third-highest revenue-producing product in Alphabet's latest quarter earnings, edged out only by advertising and Google Services.
The company on Wednesday reported its latest quarter earnings of $119.8 billion, up 24% from a year earlier. Its stock was down 1.24% at market close.
The tech executive's comments contradict the fears many publishers had when Google began integrating AI more aggressively into its search engine.
Many media companies and publishers reported their traffic dropping as users are increasingly becoming satisfied with AI answers, which are scraped from traditional websites without linking back to their sources.
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Před otevřením evropských akciových trhů futures naznačovaly převážně negativní náladu napříč hlavními burzami. Největší pokles vykazoval německý index DAX , jehož futures ztrácely 0,43 % na 25 163 bodů, což ukazovalo na slabší očekávaný start obchodování ve Frankfurtu.
Článek se odemkne 23.07.2026 9:36
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23.07.2026 8:36Výsledky dodaly Alphabet a Tesla, Evropa zahájí spíše negativně 8:26Prodej aut v EU v červnu stoupl o 13,6 procenta, dál posílili čínští výrobci 8:19Muskova automobilka Tesla zvýšila tržby o čtvrtinu, ale zisk jí klesl 22.07.2026 22:39Alphabet překonal odhady. Poptávka po AI je enormní, cloud vykázal více než 80procentní růst 22:01Akcie před výsledky technologických gigantů kolísaly, růst ropy zvýšil obavy z inflace 18:10Stát by mohl dát na burzu až 40 procent akcií pražského letiště v roce 2028, řekl Babiš 18:05A komu tím prospějete? 16:59Šéf Equinoru: EU zřejmě nesplní cíl pro naplnění zásobníků plynu před zimou 16:40Prezident Pavel vetoval spornou novelu rozpočtových zákonů 16:28Alphabet čeká klíčová zkouška. Investoři chtějí vidět návratnost investic do AI 16:27AMD investuje do firmy Anthropic až pět miliard dolarů, Antropic od AMD koupí čipy 15:01Moneta by měla pokračovat v růstu. Klíčovým tématem bude kapitál a výplata akcionářům 13:29Autonomní agent AI se při bezpečnostním testu vymkl kontrole, uvedla OpenAI 13:15Za Starmera vedl obranu, nyní bude Healey šéfem britské státní kasy. Investoři tak sází na vyšší výdaje na obranu 11:40Goldman Sachs hledá příležitosti mimo AI. Sází na spotřebu, finance i cestování 11:10Zatímco se čeká na Google, ropa poskočila výš a opatrnost se vrací 8:56Rozbřesk: O neudržitelnosti nízkých cen potravin v ČR 8:50Babiš otevřel debatu o cukrové dani. Trhy sledují také Írán, léky a energetiku 6:03Cena pojištění AI dluhu roste. Oracle se dostal na úrovně z finanční krize 21.07.2026 17:18Dobré ekonomické a investiční příběhy. Ale ve špatné době?
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Google reported blockbuster second-quarter revenue and is preparing to invest more in AI infrastructure. Bloomberg/Getty Images Google's latest earnings call offered a familiar message: AI is driving growth, and it's also getting more expensive.
On Wednesday, Alphabet reported second-quarter revenue of $119.8 billion, up 24% from a year earlier, while Google Cloud posted another blockbuster quarter as enterprises raced to adopt AI. At the same time, executives made it clear the company is prepared to spend even more to meet surging demand.
Here are the three biggest takeaways from Alphabet's earnings.
Google is spending more on AI and is willing to sacrifice marginsGoogle is prioritizing long-term AI growth over short-term profitability by doubling down on its AI buildout.
The company raised its 2026 capital expenditure forecast to between $195 billion and $205 billion, up from a previous outlook of up to $190 billion, saying demand for AI infrastructure continues to exceed available capacity.
Finance chief Anat Ashkenazi said during Wednesday's earnings call that the higher spending reflects an accelerated rollout of computing capacity.
Google also plans to lean more heavily on third-party cloud providers while it builds out its own infrastructure, a strategy Ashkenazi said will create "modest margin pressure in the near term" but help the company "keep growing our customer base and capture greater overall value."
Google Cloud is becoming the company's AI growth engineSearch remains Google's largest business, but Cloud is increasingly emerging as its primary AI growth engine.
Over Q2, Google Cloud once again delivered the strongest performance across Alphabet's businesses.
Revenue jumped 82% year over year to $24.8 billion, well ahead of analyst expectations, while cloud backlog reached $514 billion, highlighting continued demand from businesses building AI applications.
"We're still in a supply-constrained environment," Ashkenazi said, adding that Google is seeing "very strong demand both from external cloud customers as well as across the business."
About 60% of Google's infrastructure spending during the quarter went toward AI servers, with the rest invested in data centers and networking equipment.
Google's Gemini app is closing in on ChatGPTGoogle's AI assistant is approaching a milestone, signaling that Google's consumer AI strategy is gaining momentum amid intensifying competition with OpenAI and Anthropic.
The company said during Wednesday's earnings call that the Gemini app now has 950 million monthly active users, up from about 650 million last October and more than 750 million earlier this year. CEO Sundar Pichai also said during the earnings call that daily active users have tripled over the past year.
That puts Gemini within striking distance of OpenAI's ChatGPT, which recently reached roughly 1 billion monthly users.
Google is also trying to make its AI models cheaper to run. This week, it introduced three new Gemini models, including Gemini 3.6 Flash, which the company says improves coding performance while using fewer tokens, reducing the cost of deploying AI applications.
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Investors were eagerly anticipating Alphabet's (GOOG -1.20%) (GOOGL -1.44%) second-quarter earnings report on Wednesday, and the numbers did not disappoint.
Alphabet nearly doubled revenue in the key cloud segment, with Google Cloud revenue up 82% to $24.8 billion. Even more impressive was operating income in the cloud segment, which more than tripled to $8.8 billion, thanks to the boom in AI infrastructure spending.
Alphabet's overall numbers were strong as well, as revenue jumped 24% to $119.8 billion, well ahead of the consensus at $117 billion.
Operating margin also expanded from 32% to 34%, translating into $40.8 billion in operating income. Despite those strong results, Alphabet stock was down after hours, losing as much as 5% before clawing back some of those losses.
Image source: Google.
Alphabet's free cash flow goes negative While the numbers on the income statement were phenomenal, investors seem more concerned with the company's bulging capital expenditures.
Management had made it clear to investors that it was ramping up capex spending to capitalize on the opportunity in AI, and it raised its capex forecast again in the quarter, hiking it by $15 billion to $195 billion-$205 billion.
In the second quarter, the company also reported negative free cash flow for the first time ever as a publicly traded company. It brought in $39.1 billion in operating cash flow, but spent $44.9 billion on capital expenditures, giving it negative free cash flow of $5.8 billion.
After the increase in its capex forecast, the company is on track to spend around $120 billion in capex in the second half of the year, meaning that investors should expect the company to continue to report negative free cash flow.
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Should investors be worried? On a macro-level, the market seems suspicious about the massive capex spending from the four hyperscalers, Alphabet, Microsoft, Amazon, and Meta Platforms, which is likely to approach $800 billion this year.
That assumes a lot of value creation from AI in the future.
However, on an individual basis, Alphabet can easily manage a free cash outflow. The company has more than $240 billion in cash and marketable securities, and it has arguably more applications for AI spending than any other company, considering its Google Cloud business, Gemini and other generative AI investments, and its core advertising business.
While investors might see the move as risky, it should pay off over the long term. In the meantime, investors should be satisfied with 24% revenue growth, booming cloud growth, and its expanding operating margins.
Alphabet’s second-quarter earnings announcement on Wednesday (July 22) provided a clearer answer to one of the central questions surrounding generative AI: Are businesses moving quickly enough from testing the technology to paying for it at scale?
For Google, the evidence is increasingly coming from enterprise customers, where demand for computing capacity, Gemini models and AI applications contributed to an 82% increase in Google Cloud revenue and pushed Cloud backlog to $514 billion.
The scale of that demand has strengthened management’s view of the AI opportunity over the past year. Asked during the analyst Q&A whether Alphabet’s expectations for generative AI returns had changed, CEO Sundar Pichai said they had. He pointed specifically to conversations with corporate executives, saying many companies are “barely scratching the early stages of what’s possible here.”
Management has discussed supply constraints for several quarters. CFO Anat Ashkenazi acknowledged that demand continues to run ahead of the capacity Alphabet has added.
As a result, Google Cloud revenue reached $24.8 billion with Google Cloud Platform (GCP) growing faster than Cloud overall. AI infrastructure, core GCP products and AI solutions all contributed. Cloud operating income more than tripled to $8.8 billion.
Search remains the clearest test of whether Google can introduce generative AI as a tailwind to its core business. Search and other revenue rose 17% to $63.3 billion, while AI Overviews and AI Mode increasingly operate as parts of a single Search experience. Pichai said users are asking longer and more complex questions, and Google is seeing growth in total queries as people use AI features for searches they previously might not have made. The company is also extending AI Mode into more commercial queries, putting the product closer to shopping and purchase decisions.
Gemini Moves Into Search, Advertising and Commerce Gemini is becoming a larger part of that enterprise proposition. Nearly 90% of Fortune 100 companies are using Gemini Enterprise. Alphabet said nearly 500 Cloud customers have each processed more than 1 trillion tokens during the past year, while more than 2,000 enterprises have consumed more than 100 billion tokens.
Customers are deploying Gemini within cybersecurity, data analytics and other applications, where the model operates as one component of a broader system. “The model is just an ingredient in those solutions,” Pichai told analysts.
The same strategy is appearing in Google’s consumer businesses, particularly where Search intersects with advertising and shopping.
Search and other advertising revenue saw retail making the largest contribution and finance also contributing significantly. YouTube advertising revenue increased 13% to $11.1 billion, driven by direct-response and brand advertising. Overall advertising revenue rose 14%.
The company is also using Gemini throughout its advertising system, including query interpretation, advertiser tools and ads accompanying AI-powered search experiences. The company said Gemini helped produce a 20% improvement in showing relevant shopping ads. More than half of Google’s small- to medium-sized business advertising customers now use AI to create or optimize advertising creative.
Commerce is moving closer to those search and advertising products. Management said on the call that Target and Steve Madden are now live on its open-source Universal Commerce Protocol. It also announced Universal Cart, which lets consumers put merchandise from multiple retailers into one cart across Google services and complete a single checkout.
YouTube is developing a similar connection between content, advertising and transactions. Google is expanding shoppable advertising formats and has introduced Buy with Google Pay, allowing connected-TV viewers to complete purchases directly from the television in two clicks. It is also using affiliate partnerships and YouTube Shopping commissions to connect creators more directly with sales.
Gemini itself is also accumulating consumer scale. The Gemini app reached 950 million monthly active users, while daily active users have tripled over the past year. Alphabet’s model application programming interfaces (APIs) are processing approximately 22 billion tokens per minute, up from more than 16 billion a quarter earlier. More than 9 million developers are building with Google’s models each month.
Overall, Alphabet revenue increased 24% to $119.8 billion, while operating income rose 30% to $40.8 billion.
The cost of supplying AI demand remains part of the equation. Capital expenditures reached $44.9 billion during the quarter, and Alphabet raised its 2026 capital spending forecast to $195 billion to $205 billion from $180 billion to $190 billion. Management said the increase reflects faster deployment of computing capacity, while third-party capacity will temporarily supplement Google’s infrastructure. Investors, perhaps eyeing that ramp-up in investment, sent shares down 3.5% in after hours trading.
Asked about returns on additional computing investment in 2027, Pichai pointed to long-term customer agreements, renewals and continuing demand.
“We are seeing strong demand indicators, including long-term deals,” he said. “If anything, the dynamics look healthier than where we were about a year ago, and so that’s what gives us the confidence to undertake those investments.”
Item 1 of 2 Google's CEO Sundar Pichai speaks at Google's I/O 2026 developer conference in Mountain View, California, U.S. May 19, 2026. REUTERS/Manuel Orbegozo/File Photo
[1/2]Google's CEO Sundar Pichai speaks at Google's I/O 2026 developer conference in Mountain View, California, U.S. May 19, 2026. REUTERS/Manuel Orbegozo/File Photo Purchase Licensing Rights, opens new tab
SummaryCompaniesGemini 3.5 Pro remains in partner testing after Google delayed its planned June releasePichai says Gemini 4 roadmap involves releases almost at a monthly cadencePichai emphasizes Flash models for cybersecurity, customer service, analytics and enterprise softwareShares dropped over 3% after hours and are down about 9% since AprilJuly 22 (Reuters) - Alphabet (GOOGL.O), opens new tab CEO Sundar Pichai used Wednesday's earnings call to mount a robust defence of Google's AI strategy, pushing back on concerns that the company has fallen behind rivals after delaying a flagship model and ceding ground in AI coding.
Investors have become increasingly uneasy over Google delaying the release of Gemini 3.5 Pro, a model originally slated for June that was expected to bolster the company's standing in AI coding and autonomous "agent" tasks, two of the industry's most fiercely contested areas.
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The latest setback has fueled worries that Google was losing momentum just as OpenAI and Anthropic and a host of Chinese rivals have accelerated the pace of model releases. On the call on Wednesday, Pichai struck an unusually defensive tone as analysts pressed him on the state of Google's frontier models and whether they could still compete at the cutting edge of AI development.
"We've had clearly frontier models. There are many attributes on which we are still at the frontier; there are areas where we've acknowledged we need to improve and coding and agentic coding is an example of that," he said in response to JPMorgan analyst Doug Anmuth, who questioned whether Gemini could remain competitive at the industry's leading edge and noted Google's slower release of models.
Rather than dwell on the Gemini 3.5 Pro delay, Pichai repeatedly highlighted Gemini Flash, Google's cheaper, faster "workhorse" model that powers a growing range of applications, including cybersecurity, customer-service agents, data analytics and enterprise software.
He pointed to Gemini 3.6 Flash, released this week, saying it had improved by more than 10 points on a coding benchmark compared with the previous version while using fewer tokens. The company on Tuesday also unveiled Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite and a cybersecurity-focused Flash Cyber model, while keeping Gemini 3.5 Pro in partner testing.
"I think people will be pleased" when Google unveils Gemini 4, Pichai said, describing it as a "very ambitious effort." He stressed that Google is training a significantly larger model designed to compete at the frontier when it is released, adding that the company remains "very committed and very confident" about staying at the leading edge of AI.
When Barclays analyst Ross Sandler raised similar concerns about Google's model release pace, Pichai disclosed that Gemini 4's roadmap includes rolling out models "almost at a monthly cadence."
Pichai's vigorous defence underscores a growing challenge facing Google: persuading investors to judge its AI ambitions not by the delay of a single flagship model, but by the scale of an ecosystem spanning cloud infrastructure, custom AI chips and a portfolio of Gemini models embedded across its products and services.
While Google posted another quarter of blistering cloud growth on Wednesday — up 82%, far above an average estimate of 64% — Wall Street is increasingly focused on whether the company can regain leadership in AI coding and frontier reasoning, especially as its capital costs skyrocket.
Alphabet raised its capex plans by $15 billion to a range of $195 billion to $205 billion.
The company's shares fell more than 3% in after-hours trading. Concerns over Gemini's delays, coupled with several high-profile executive departures, have left the stock down about 9% since the end of April.
Reporting by Deborah Sophia in Bengaluru and Kenrick Cai in San Francisco; Editing by Sayantani Ghosh and Shri Navaratnam
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles., opens new tab
Kenrick Cai is a correspondent for Reuters based in San Francisco. He covers Google, its parent company Alphabet and artificial intelligence. Cai joined Reuters in 2024. He previously worked at Forbes magazine, where he was a staff writer covering venture capital and startups. He received a Best in Business award from the Society for Advancing Business Editing and Writing in 2023. He is a graduate of Duke University. Reach him on Signal at @kenrick.01.
When Alphabet and Tesla kicked off tech earnings season on Wednesday, one theme became immediately clear: AI spending is under a microscope.
Both companies reported negative free cash flow for the latest quarter and told investors to prepare for higher capital expenditures. They both also reported better-than-expected revenue, but that wasn't enough to prevent an after-market selloff, with Tesla shares sliding 4% and Alphabet down more than 3%.
It's a potentially ominous sign for the tech industry, particularly the other megacaps, which are mostly set to report quarterly results next week. Meta and Microsoft are scheduled to report next Wednesday, followed a day later by Amazon and Apple.
Much of the AI boom to date has been fueled by historic levels of infrastructure spending among a small crop of companies, including hefty investments into model developers OpenAI and Anthropic. But the recent emergence of cheaper open-source models, largely out of China, along with signs that corporate America is getting more frugal when it comes to spending on AI services, has raised concerns about the future returns on investment.
Heading into Wednesday's reports, Alphabet's stock was already on pace for its third straight monthly decline after surging in April, while Tesla shares were down 11% in July and 17% for the year. The tech-heavy Nasdaq has dropped about 5% since reaching a record in early June.
While Alphabet and Tesla are both spending at unprecedented levels, their numbers vary dramatically.
Google's parent company forecast capex for this year of $195 billion to $205 billion and warned of higher numbers in 2027. Prior guidance was for spending of $180 billion to $190 billion. At the top end of the new range, Alphabet could be the biggest spender in tech this year, as Amazon's latest guidance was for more than $200 billion, though that number may increase when the company reports results next week.
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Google and its hyperscaler peers are building out data centers packed with advanced chips so they can provide the computing power necessary to build and run the leading AI models and the services they power.
Mizuho analysts wrote in a note that Google's capex increase was "broadly anticipated," and that the overall story is positive, largely due to the surge in cloud revenue, which jumped 82% from a year earlier, blowing past estimates. Cloud margins expanded and usage of Google's Gemini model accelerated.
"As such we are surprised the stock is trading off after hours and would expect it to recover in trading tomorrow," wrote the analysts, who recommend buying the stock.
'As fast as we can spend'Tesla reiterated expectations for more than $25 billion in capex this year, which would represent about 200% year-over-year growth. In the second quarter, capex soared 142% to $5.79 billion. The company boosted spending on self-driving technology, AI and robotics initiatives that CEO Elon Musk has been touting for years.
Tesla is now retooling its factories to make the two-seater driverless Cybercab, and to manufacture Optimus humanoid robots, which are still being developed, while also preparing to start construction of a sprawling AI chip-manufacturing plant in Texas.
"We should be spending on capex as fast as we can spend, as fast as we can without it being too wasteful," Musk said on the earnings call. He added, "It's ok to be a little less capital efficient if we get things done sooner."
For both companies, the aggressive growth plans are resulting in a major hit to their cash holdings.
Free cash flow at Tesla turned negative in the quarter, with a deficit of $1.1 billion after the company generated $146 million in free cash flow a year ago and $1.44 billion in the first quarter of 2026.
"This is a massive capex year but we are confident that all the things that we are investing in will yield incredible returns," Musk said. He compared Tesla's spending and building in "many different arenas simultaneously," to that of Henry Ford with the Model T.
"I think probably this is the fastest industrial scale-up since World War II in America," Musk said.
watch now
The numbers at Alphabet were even more stark, with free cash flow sinking to negative $5.9 billion after the company, which is lauded for its fat margins from online ads, generated almost $25 billion in free cash flow a year ago.
"We expect the free cash flow will remain under pressure, driven by our investments in technical infrastructure, which enables us to capitalize on the AI opportunity and continue to drive attractive returns," CFO Anat Ashkenazi said on the earnings call.
Most of the company's $44.9 billion in capex in the second quarter went to infrastructure to support the AI buildout, Ashkenazi said.
In addition to building its own data centers, Google executives said they also plan to rely on capacity from third-party cloud providers to meet feverish computing demand, building on a recent compute deal with Musk's SpaceX, which now owns xAI and its Memphis data centers.
The results on Wednesday did nothing to squash the enthusiasm of bullish analysts and investors.
Keith Fitz-Gerald, principal at investment consulting firm Fitz-Gerald Group, said that at Tesla, "profitability is being sacrificed for infrastructure" just as it was previously at companies including Amazon and Netflix.
"I expect it to pay off in spades over the next 12-24, even 36 months," Fitz-Gerald wrote in a note after the report.
And Rebecca Wettemann, CEO of tech research firm Valoir, said in an email that Google's core business remains strong and that its AI investments are generating returns.
"Google's momentum should calm some market fears about AI overspending," she wrote. "Strong performance across its businesses show search isn't dead, advertising still matters, and cloud investment is still a good bet."
ToplineAlphabet on Wednesday reported its 12th-straight quarter of double-digit revenue growth, boosted by another surge in Google Cloud sales as nearly 1 billion people now use the firm’s AI models.
The Google parent reported its 12th-straight quarter of double-digit revenue growth.
Gado via Getty Images
Key FactsAlphabet reported second-quarter revenue of $119.8 billion, an annual increase of 24%, surpassing Wall Street’s projections of $117 billion, according to FactSet.
The Google parent posted $9.11 earnings per share in what it called a year-over-year surge of 295%—the figure marked a roughly 291% annual increase and smashed consensus analyst estimates of $2.88 earnings per share.
Google Cloud revenue surged 82% to $24.8 billion, above estimates of $22.4 billion, as operating income from the segment more than tripled to $8.8 billion, driven by demand for AI products and infrastructure, Alphabet reported.
Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai said in a statement the company’s Gemini has 950 million monthly active users, up from the 750 million it reported for Q4 2025.
Shares of Alphabet fell around 3% following its earnings report, but Deepwater Asset Management analyst Gene Munster suggested shares could rise on Thursday, citing the jump in Google Cloud revenue as the “most important number and it was a massive beat.”
what to watch forHow Alphabet’s spending compares to its mega-cap competitors. The company reported $44.9 billion in capital expenditures through its latest quarter, doubling its figure last year. Earlier estimates from Amazon, Alphabet, Microsoft and Meta indicated the firms would spend up to $750 billion this year as each worked to match growing demand for AI products.
big number$97.8 billion. That’s how much Alphabet earned from “other income,” up from just $2.2 billion last year. Alphabet said the bump largely came from its equity securities, which include investments in Anthropic and SpaceX.
key backgroundAlphabet’s three years of quarterly revenue growth reflect the tech giant’s aggressive pivot toward AI. The Google parent has committed hundreds of billions of dollars to build data centers and other AI projects, and the firm reportedly has plans to develop a new in-house AI chip that Google engineers expect to be up to 10 times more energy-efficient than its predecessor. Pichai said Alphabet’s AI investments are “redefining what’s possible across every part of our business,” noting its “full-stack approach to AI delivering real, measurable value” to consumers.
further readingForbesAlphabet Rally Boosts Google Cofounder Fortunes By $15 Billion—Here’s Why Shares Are UpBy Ty Roush
Falling 0.57% to 25,691, the Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC -0.57%) led the market lower as rising oil prices pressured growth stocks, while the S&P 500 (^GSPC -0.14%) slipped 0.13% to 7,499 and the Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI -0.01%) finished nearly flat, down 0.01% to 52,219.
Gold prices gained 1.49% to $4,137.10 as of U.S. market close and the 10-Year Treasury yield rose 0.03% to 4.63%, as the Utilities sector climbed while Communication Services and Healthcare shares finished lower.
Today's biggest movesSuper Micro Computer rocketed 26% on a record backlog, while AT&T smashed EPS expectations, sending its stock 4% higher. Elsewhere, Rocket Lab stock opened higher, but sold off to end the day largely flat after announcing a $266 million contract with the U.S. government for 12 suborbital launches.
On the negative side, Reddit slipped 8% after a report suggested the company may limit Alphabet’s access to its massive trove of content for AI training. However, this is likely just posturing in hopes of negotiating a better licensing deal with the Magnificent Seven juggernaut.
What this means for investorsNow, the market’s attention is largely on Alphabet and Tesla after hours, as the two stocks just reported their second-quarter earnings. As of 5:45 p.m. ET, Alphabet stock was down 4%, and Tesla had dipped 5%.
While Alphabet delivered sales growth of 24%, headlined by its cloud department’s revenue soaring 81%, free cash flow turned negative as operating cash flow was outweighed by $45 billion in capital expenditures during the quarter.
As for Tesla, revenue rose 26%, but adjusted EPS was well below Wall Street expectations, pressuring shares. Tesla will likely remain volatile as it transitions production from mostly EVs to Cybercabs, Megapack 3, Tesla Semi, Optimus robots, and other new verticals.
Currently, Nasdaq futures are down 1%.
Josh Kohn-Lindquist has positions in Alphabet, Rocket Lab, and Tesla. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Alphabet, Reddit, Rocket Lab, and Tesla. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
Alphabet investors have very publicly worried that the company’s massive AI spending isn’t worth the money. With the company’s latest earnings report, those investors should be able to relax a little.
The takeaway: Google’s cloud business — driven largely by enterprise AI adoption — is booming. The search giant saw Google Cloud revenue spike 82% from where it was this time last year, climbing to $24.8 billion. That’s well above last quarter’s generous year-over-year growth, which showed a revenue jump of 63% to $20 billion — and it handily beats what Wall Street analysts expected for this quarter’s growth (the expectation was $22.46 billion).
Those cloud gains were driven largely by enterprise AI solutions and enterprise AI infrastructure adoption, the company said, while also noting that its backlog of cloud contracting work — that is, work that it hasn’t yet converted into revenue — had climbed to $514 billion.
The company’s profit hit $112.1 billion, which is a massive jump from this time last year, when the company reported $28.1 billion in profit, the company’s earnings report shows. Meanwhile, Alphabet’s overall revenue grew 24% year-over-year during the past quarter to $119.8 billion. The company also saw Google Services revenue jump 15% to $94.5 billion.
“Our AI investments are redefining what’s possible across every part of our business,” said Google CEO Sundar Pichai during Wednesday’s earnings call. “We have exciting momentum across the board.”
More people are also adopting Gemini, Google’s AI chatbot, as the app currently enjoys 950 million monthly active users, the company said. In Q4 of 2025, Google reported that the app had 750 million users.
It’s worth noting that spiking revenue isn’t unusual for Google. This marks the company’s 12th consecutive quarter of double-digit revenue growth. But even by that standard, this quarter represents a particularly bountiful period for the tech giant.
Alphabet’s spending is still hefty, with its capital expenditures — the money it spends building data centers, buying chips, and expanding infrastructure — estimated to be between $180 billion and $190 billion for the year — a fact not lost on analysts during Wednesday’s earnings call. Several pressed Pichai on when, and how much, those investments will pay off.
“I think our compute capacity investments in ’27,” he said. “We are seeing strong demand indicators, including long-term deals,” he continued. “I think, if anything, the dynamics look healthier than where we were about a year ago, so that’s what gives us the confidence to undertake those investments,” he said.
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Lucas is a senior writer at TechCrunch, where he covers artificial intelligence, consumer tech, and startups. He previously covered AI and cybersecurity at Gizmodo. You can contact Lucas by emailing [email protected].
Alphabet Is Planning a New AI Chip. Here's Why It Matters Ahead of EarningsAlphabet NASDAQ: GOOG executives said the company’s second-quarter 2026 results were driven by broad demand for artificial intelligence across Search, YouTube and Google Cloud, while also signaling that heavy infrastructure spending will continue as capacity remains constrained.
Chief Executive Sundar Pichai said Alphabet revenue rose 24% year-over-year, citing “exciting momentum” across the company’s core businesses. Search and other revenue grew 17%, YouTube advertising revenue increased 13%, and Google Cloud revenue rose 82%, he said. Cloud backlog reached $514 billion.
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Oracle Is One Step From Junk—Can It Afford the AI Boom?“Our AI investments are redefining what’s possible across every part of our business,” Pichai said.
AI Adoption Drives Product Momentum Pichai said Alphabet is seeing strong usage growth for its Gemini model family, including newly announced Gemini 3.6 Flash and 3.5 Flash-Lite models. He described the Flash series as a “workhorse” product because of its balance of performance and cost. Alphabet also launched Gemini 3.5 Flash Cyber, which Pichai said can be paired with the CodeMender agent to identify and fix vulnerabilities.
Bank Earnings Are Roaring, But Wall Street Isn't Ready to CelebratePichai said more than 9 million developers are building each month with Alphabet’s models across APIs and developer products. The company’s model APIs are processing about 22 billion tokens per minute, up from 16 billion in the prior quarter.
The Gemini app reached 950 million monthly active users, with daily active users tripling over the past year, Pichai said. He also said that since the company launched Omni at Google I/O in May, there has been a 40% increase in daily active users creating videos on the Gemini app.
In Search, Pichai said Alphabet brought AI Overviews and AI Mode together into one “seamless Search experience.” AI Mode has surpassed 1 billion monthly active users since expanding globally last October, he said. Pichai added that AI features in Search are sending “billions of clicks to websites every week.”
Search and YouTube Advertising Grow Philipp Schindler, Alphabet’s chief business officer, said Google Services revenue was $95 billion for the quarter, up 15% year-over-year and primarily driven by Search. Search and Other revenue reached more than $63 billion, with retail and finance making the largest contributions. YouTube advertising revenue grew 13%, driven by direct response and brand advertising, while Network advertising revenue declined 1%.
Schindler said Alphabet is using Gemini across its advertising infrastructure to improve ad quality, advertiser tools and AI user experiences. He said Gemini has helped improve query understanding, particularly for longer searches that were previously harder to monetize. In shopping ads, Schindler said the company drove a 20% improvement in showing highly relevant ads.
He also highlighted AI Max, which is now out of beta and has been adopted by half a million advertisers. Advertisers using AI-powered campaigns such as AI Max or Performance Max see an average of 15% more conversions or value on Search at a similar return on ad spend, Schindler said.
YouTube also benefited from the FIFA World Cup 2026. Pichai said more than 1.7 billion unique viewers globally watched World Cup-related videos on YouTube. Schindler said more than 550 million watched those videos on televisions, making the tournament the most viewed World Cup in YouTube history.
Google Cloud Revenue Surges 82% Chief Financial Officer Anat Ashkenazi said Google Cloud revenue increased 82% to $24.8 billion, driven primarily by Google Cloud Platform, which grew faster than Cloud overall. She said core GCP, AI solutions and AI infrastructure were all important contributors. Alphabet also began recognizing revenue from TPU system sales delivered to customer data centers for the first time in the quarter.
Cloud operating income was $8.8 billion, more than tripling from the year-earlier period, while operating margin rose to 35.6% from 20.7%. Ashkenazi said Cloud backlog increased by more than $50 billion sequentially to $514 billion, driven by demand for enterprise AI offerings. Alphabet expects to recognize just over 50% of that backlog as revenue over the next 24 months.
Pichai said Gemini Enterprise has been adopted by nearly 90% of Fortune 100 companies. He also said nearly 500 Cloud customers each processed more than 1 trillion tokens in the last year, and more than 2,000 enterprises consumed more than 100 billion tokens over the same period.
Security was another focus area. Pichai said 90% of Fortune 100 companies are Google Cloud security users, and nearly 90% of Wiz customers are using AI-powered security features. Alphabet reported a more than 45% quarter-over-quarter increase in AI workloads scanned and protected by its security platform.
CapEx Guidance Raised as Capacity Remains Tight Ashkenazi said consolidated revenue was $119.8 billion, up 24%, or 23% in constant currency. Operating income increased 30% to $40.8 billion, and operating margin was 34%. Alphabet generated $39.1 billion in operating cash flow during the quarter, but free cash flow was negative $5.9 billion due to capital expenditures.
Capital expenditures totaled $44.9 billion in the second quarter, with the “vast majority” going to technical infrastructure for AI. About 60% of technical infrastructure investment was in servers, while 40% was in data centers and networking equipment.
Ashkenazi raised Alphabet’s full-year 2026 capital expenditure guidance to a range of $195 billion to $205 billion, up from a previous estimate of $180 billion to $190 billion. She said the increase reflects accelerated capacity delivery to meet demand. Alphabet also expects capital expenditures to increase significantly in 2027.
“We’re still in a supply-constrained environment,” Ashkenazi said during the question-and-answer session, adding that Alphabet will continue investing as long as it sees attractive returns.
Ashkenazi also said Alphabet plans to expand its use of third-party capacity in the third quarter as a bridge while it builds more internal capacity. She said that strategy should help Alphabet continue growing its customer base, but it will create modest near-term margin pressure.
Executives Address Model Competition and Long-Term Bets Asked about returns on generative AI investments, Pichai said Alphabet is in the “very early innings” of a secular shift across consumer and enterprise markets. He said the company has become “more bullish” on the opportunities over the past year.
On model competition, Pichai said the frontier remains dynamic, but Alphabet is committed to competing at that level. He said the company is training Gemini 4 and is aiming to increase the pace of model releases, potentially moving toward a monthly cadence.
Executives also discussed Alphabet’s other bets. Pichai said Waymo introduced its newest vehicle, Oasis, to public riders, powered by the sixth-generation Waymo Driver. Wing has completed more than 1 million home deliveries and continues to grow through partnerships with Walmart, DoorDash and Papa John’s. In health and drug discovery, Isomorphic Labs raised more than $2 billion to support its AI drug design engine and drug candidate pipeline.
Ashkenazi said the board declared a quarterly cash dividend of $0.22 per share, payable in September. Alphabet ended the quarter with $242.5 billion in cash and marketable securities, including $87.1 billion of marketable equity securities, and $98.2 billion in long-term debt.
About Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOG)Alphabet Inc NASDAQ: GOOG is a multinational technology holding company headquartered in Mountain View, California. Formed in 2015 through a corporate restructuring of Google, Alphabet serves as the parent to Google LLC and a portfolio of businesses collectively known as "Other Bets." Google was originally founded in 1998 by Larry Page and Sergey Brin; Alphabet is led by CEO Sundar Pichai, who oversees Google and the broader company while the founders remain prominent shareholders and influential figures in the company's history.
Alphabet's core business centers on internet search and advertising, with Google Search and the company's ad platforms (including Google Ads and AdSense) generating the majority of revenue by connecting advertisers with consumers worldwide.
This instant news alert was generated by narrative science technology and financial data from MarketBeat in order to provide readers with the fastest reporting and unbiased coverage. Please send any questions or comments about this story to [email protected].
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Alphabet (GOOGL - Free Report) came out with quarterly earnings of $9.11 per share, beating the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $2.88 per share. This compares to earnings of $2.31 per share a year ago. These figures are adjusted for non-recurring items.
This quarterly report represents an earnings surprise of +216.32%. A quarter ago, it was expected that this internet search leader would post earnings of $2.64 per share when it actually produced earnings of $5.11, delivering a surprise of +93.56%.
Over the last four quarters, the company has surpassed consensus EPS estimates four times.
Alphabet, which belongs to the Zacks Internet - Services industry, posted revenues of $103.62 billion for the quarter ended June 2026, surpassing the Zacks Consensus Estimate by 2.31%. This compares to year-ago revenues of $81.72 billion. The company has topped consensus revenue estimates four times over the last four quarters.
The sustainability of the stock's immediate price movement based on the recently-released numbers and future earnings expectations will mostly depend on management's commentary on the earnings call.
Alphabet shares have added about 10.9% since the beginning of the year versus the S&P 500's gain of 9.7%.
What's Next for Alphabet?While Alphabet has outperformed the market so far this year, the question that comes to investors' minds is: what's next for the stock?
There are no easy answers to this key question, but one reliable measure that can help investors address this is the company's earnings outlook. Not only does this include current consensus earnings expectations for the coming quarter(s), but also how these expectations have changed lately.
Empirical research shows a strong correlation between near-term stock movements and trends in earnings estimate revisions. Investors can track such revisions by themselves or rely on a tried-and-tested rating tool like the Zacks Rank, which has an impressive track record of harnessing the power of earnings estimate revisions.
Ahead of this earnings release, the estimate revisions trend for Alphabet was favorable. While the magnitude and direction of estimate revisions could change following the company's just-released earnings report, the current status translates into a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy) for the stock. So, the shares are expected to outperform the market in the near future. You can see the complete list of today's Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.
It will be interesting to see how estimates for the coming quarters and the current fiscal year change in the days ahead. The current consensus EPS estimate is $3.04 on $108.03 billion in revenues for the coming quarter and $14.34 on $423.86 billion in revenues for the current fiscal year.
Investors should be mindful of the fact that the outlook for the industry can have a material impact on the performance of the stock as well. In terms of the Zacks Industry Rank, Internet - Services is currently in the top 43% of the 250 plus Zacks industries. Our research shows that the top 50% of the Zacks-ranked industries outperform the bottom 50% by a factor of more than 2 to 1.
One other stock from the same industry, Lyft (LYFT - Free Report) , is yet to report results for the quarter ended June 2026. The results are expected to be released on August 6.
This ride-hailing company is expected to post quarterly earnings of $0.39 per share in its upcoming report, which represents a year-over-year change of +56%. The consensus EPS estimate for the quarter has remained unchanged over the last 30 days.
Lyft's revenues are expected to be $1.81 billion, up 13.7% from the year-ago quarter.
Alphabet Inc. (GOOG - Free Report) came out with quarterly earnings of $9.11 per share, beating the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $2.88 per share. This compares to earnings of $2.31 per share a year ago. These figures are adjusted for non-recurring items.
This quarterly report represents an earnings surprise of +216.32%. A quarter ago, it was expected that this company would post earnings of $2.64 per share when it actually produced earnings of $5.11, delivering a surprise of +93.56%.
Over the last four quarters, the company has surpassed consensus EPS estimates four times.
Alphabet, which belongs to the Zacks Internet - Services industry, posted revenues of $103.62 billion for the quarter ended June 2026, surpassing the Zacks Consensus Estimate by 2.31%. This compares to year-ago revenues of $81.72 billion. The company has topped consensus revenue estimates four times over the last four quarters.
The sustainability of the stock's immediate price movement based on the recently-released numbers and future earnings expectations will mostly depend on management's commentary on the earnings call.
Alphabet shares have added about 10.3% since the beginning of the year versus the S&P 500's gain of 9.7%.
What's Next for Alphabet?While Alphabet has outperformed the market so far this year, the question that comes to investors' minds is: what's next for the stock?
There are no easy answers to this key question, but one reliable measure that can help investors address this is the company's earnings outlook. Not only does this include current consensus earnings expectations for the coming quarter(s), but also how these expectations have changed lately.
Empirical research shows a strong correlation between near-term stock movements and trends in earnings estimate revisions. Investors can track such revisions by themselves or rely on a tried-and-tested rating tool like the Zacks Rank, which has an impressive track record of harnessing the power of earnings estimate revisions.
Ahead of this earnings release, the estimate revisions trend for Alphabet was favorable. While the magnitude and direction of estimate revisions could change following the company's just-released earnings report, the current status translates into a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy) for the stock. So, the shares are expected to outperform the market in the near future. You can see the complete list of today's Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.
It will be interesting to see how estimates for the coming quarters and the current fiscal year change in the days ahead. The current consensus EPS estimate is $3.04 on $107.98 billion in revenues for the coming quarter and $14.34 on $423.73 billion in revenues for the current fiscal year.
Investors should be mindful of the fact that the outlook for the industry can have a material impact on the performance of the stock as well. In terms of the Zacks Industry Rank, Internet - Services is currently in the top 43% of the 250 plus Zacks industries. Our research shows that the top 50% of the Zacks-ranked industries outperform the bottom 50% by a factor of more than 2 to 1.
Another stock from the same industry, Dropbox (DBX - Free Report) , has yet to report results for the quarter ended June 2026. The results are expected to be released on August 6.
This online file-sharing company is expected to post quarterly earnings of $0.74 per share in its upcoming report, which represents a year-over-year change of +4.2%. The consensus EPS estimate for the quarter has remained unchanged over the last 30 days.
Dropbox's revenues are expected to be $625.6 million, down 0% from the year-ago quarter.
SummaryAlphabet Inc. posted a strong Q2, with revenue up 24% year over year. The standout was Google Cloud, where revenue surged 82% and operating margins expanded sharply.The main debate is not demand but spending. Q2 CapEx rose to $44.9B, pushing quarterly free cash flow into negative territory, yet that spending is supported by a $514B Cloud.Cloud is no longer just a growth story. It is becoming a major profit engine for Alphabet, with operating margins rising from 20.7% to 35.6% and growing adoption of the.I maintain a Strong Buy rating on GOOG stock. Near-term Free Cash Flow (FCF) will likely remain under pressure, but cloud growth, margin expansion, and AI monetization support a compelling long-term opportunity. Nicolae Popescu/iStock via Getty Images
Executive Summary I know you're all here trying to figure out how Alphabet Inc.'s (GOOG) (GOOGL) highly anticipated quarterly results really went. So let’s cut to the chase; we’ve got plenty of other
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Analyst’s Disclosure: I/we have a beneficial long position in the shares of GOOGL either through stock ownership, options, or other derivatives. I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it (other than from Seeking Alpha). I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article.
Seeking Alpha's Disclosure: Past performance is no guarantee of future results. No recommendation or advice is being given as to whether any investment is suitable for a particular investor. Any views or opinions expressed above may not reflect those of Seeking Alpha as a whole. Seeking Alpha is not a licensed securities dealer, broker or US investment adviser or investment bank. Our analysts are third party authors that include both professional investors and individual investors who may not be licensed or certified by any institute or regulatory body.
Editor’s Note: The transcripts have been removed and were published in error.
Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) released second-quarter financial results and hosted an earnings call on Wednesday. Read the complete transcript below.
Benzinga APIs provide real-time access to earnings call transcripts and financial data. Visit https://www.benzinga.com/apis/ to learn more.
The full earnings call is available at https://abc.xyz/investor/events/event-details/2026/2026-Q2-Earnings-Call-2026-GgTAq7Is0z/default.aspx
SummaryAlphabet Inc reported its financial performance for the second quarter of 2026, highlighting strong revenue growth driven by its core services and new initiatives.
The company emphasized its strategic focus on AI technology, particularly through the development and implementation of AI-driven solutions like Gemini, which aims to solve complex problems across various sectors.
YouTube TV was highlighted as a key product with expanding service plans, reflecting the company’s commitment to diversifying its revenue streams beyond traditional advertising.
Alphabet Inc announced continued investment in its cloud services, aiming to leverage AI capabilities to enhance its offerings and maintain competitive advantage.
Management expressed optimism about the future, focusing on the potential of AI to drive growth and innovation, while also addressing the company’s mission to tackle solvable diseases with new technology.
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For the quarter ended June 2026, Alphabet (GOOGL - Free Report) reported revenue of $103.62 billion, up 26.8% over the same period last year. EPS came in at $9.11, compared to $2.31 in the year-ago quarter.
The reported revenue represents a surprise of +2.31% over the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $101.28 billion. With the consensus EPS estimate being $2.88, the EPS surprise was +216.32%.
While investors scrutinize revenue and earnings changes year-over-year and how they compare with Wall Street expectations to determine their next move, some key metrics always offer a more accurate picture of a company's financial health.
As these metrics influence top- and bottom-line performance, comparing them to the year-ago numbers and what analysts estimated helps investors project a stock's price performance more accurately.
Here is how Alphabet performed in the just reported quarter in terms of the metrics most widely monitored and projected by Wall Street analysts:
Total TAC (traffic acquisition costs): $16.18 billion versus $16.22 billion estimated by nine analysts on average.Headcount (Number of employees): 198,933 versus the three-analyst average estimate of 196,768.Revenues- EMEA: $32.5 billion versus the two-analyst average estimate of $33.39 billion. The reported number represents a year-over-year change of +15%.Revenues- United States: $60.85 billion versus the two-analyst average estimate of $56.66 billion. The reported number represents a year-over-year change of +32.1%.Revenues- Other Americas (Canada and Latin America): $7.03 billion versus $6.93 billion estimated by two analysts on average. Compared to the year-ago quarter, this number represents a +22.5% change.Revenues- APAC: $19.32 billion compared to the $20.54 billion average estimate based on two analysts. The reported number represents a change of +17.2% year over year.Revenues- YouTube ads: $11.06 billion compared to the $10.76 billion average estimate based on eight analysts. The reported number represents a change of +12.9% year over year.Revenues- Google Cloud: $24.77 billion versus the eight-analyst average estimate of $22.77 billion. The reported number represents a year-over-year change of +81.8%.Revenues- Google advertising: $81.63 billion compared to the $81.62 billion average estimate based on eight analysts. The reported number represents a change of +14.4% year over year.Revenues- Google Search & other: $63.27 billion compared to the $63.52 billion average estimate based on eight analysts. The reported number represents a change of +16.8% year over year.Revenues- Google Network: $7.3 billion compared to the $7.08 billion average estimate based on eight analysts. The reported number represents a change of -0.7% year over year.Revenues- Google subscriptions, platforms, and devices: $12.91 billion compared to the $12.85 billion average estimate based on seven analysts. The reported number represents a change of +15.3% year over year.View all Key Company Metrics for Alphabet here>>>
Shares of Alphabet have returned +0.3% over the past month versus the Zacks S&P 500 composite's +0.3% change. The stock currently has a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy), indicating that it could outperform the broader market in the near term.
Google CEO Sundar Pichai. Bloomberg/Getty Images Imagine making nearly $100 billion extra and dedicating exactly one vague sentence to it. That's just what Google parent Alphabet did in its second quarter earnings report.
The tech giant reported that its "other income" totaled $98 billion in the second quarter, noting it came from unrealized gains on its investments.
Analysts didn't ask Alphabet executives about the gain on its earnings call. Instead, they focused on its rising capital expenditures and position in the AI race. The tech giant's stock closed down about 1.24%.
It's not the first time Alphabet has done this. In April 2025, the company disclosed a similar $8 billion paper gain. Google has no obligation to disclose exactly where those gains come from, and it doesn't.
The gains are almost certainly related to very savvy investments the company has made in companies like SpaceX, Anthropic, and Databricks.
Google was an early SpaceX investor, buying about 7% of the company in 2015. SpaceX also uses Google Cloud for its Starlink service. SpaceX is currently worth about $1.5 trillion dollars since its IPO last month. Google invested in SpaceX when it was worth only about $12 billion — that's a 133x return.
Google is also heavily invested in Anthropic, owning about a 14% stake in the company as of last March, according to filings seen by the New York Times. The AI lab was valued at almost $1 trillion in a massive $65 billion funding round in May. Some investors think it's already worth $1.2 trillion.
Additionally, Google is an investor in Databricks, which was valued at $188 billion in a funding round earlier this month.
Google, SpaceX, Anthropic, and Databricks didn't respond to requests for comment.
Google's investing chops are certainly impressive. But investors are more concerned about Google's own prospects.
The tech giant hiked its capital expenditures to a maximum of $205 billion this year as it races to compete on AI. While Google has strong advantages in distribution and chipmaking, its efforts to build a leading AI model haven't paid off.
It keeps delaying its next big AI chatbot, which some rivals are mocking online.
Still, many analysts remain bullish on Google's fundamentals. Its revenue jumped by almost 25% compared to last year on the back of strong ads and cloud sales, which are also being boosted by AI.
"Another impressive quarter for Google," said Emarketer principal analyst Nate Elliott.
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Charles Rollet You're currently following this author! Want to unfollow? Unsubscribe via the link in your email.
Charles Rollet is BI's tech correspondent in San Francisco. Prior to joining BI, Charles worked at TechCrunch covering startups and VC. Charles is based in the Bay Area, where he enjoys hiking with his dogs. You can contact Charles securely on Signal at charlesrollet.12 or +1-628-282-2811.
Alphabet Inc. delivered a solid Q2, with a 24% revenue growth and a 30% operating income growth, driven by strong operating leverage and strong operational metrics. AI and Search remain the key growth engines, with search growing 17%; but the highlight is the Cloud division (delivered a ~80% growth). The heavy CapEx pushed free cash flow to negative $5 billion, which may concern some investors but reflects investments to meet the booming AI demand.
Analyst’s Disclosure: I/we have a beneficial long position in the shares of BRK.B, GOOG either through stock ownership, options, or other derivatives. I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it (other than from Seeking Alpha). I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article.
Seeking Alpha's Disclosure: Past performance is no guarantee of future results. No recommendation or advice is being given as to whether any investment is suitable for a particular investor. Any views or opinions expressed above may not reflect those of Seeking Alpha as a whole. Seeking Alpha is not a licensed securities dealer, broker or US investment adviser or investment bank. Our analysts are third party authors that include both professional investors and individual investors who may not be licensed or certified by any institute or regulatory body.
Characteristics and Risks of Standardized Options: https://bit.ly/2v9tH6D. CapEx will be in full focus for Alphabet (GOOGL) investors once the company reports earnings, says Kevin Hincks.
"All eyes are clearly going to be on cloud revenue as well as CapEx numbers," says Angelo Zino as he discusses expectations for Alphabet (GOOGL) earnings. He notes a very high bar for the stock with Wall Street eyeing 20% growth.
SummaryCompaniesRevenue at Google Cloud rose 82% to $24.8 billion during Q2Total revenue for the quarter was $119.8 billion, beating estimatesShares of the company were down more than 3% in extended trading after capex announcementJuly 22 (Reuters) - Alphabet (GOOGL.O), opens new tab hiked its capital spending guidance for 2026 by $15 billion after reporting the best-ever quarter of growth for its cloud computing division, driven by strong demand from AI-hungry enterprises worldwide.
The search giant now expects to spend between $195 billion and $205 billion in capital expenditures, its finance chief Anat Ashkenazi said on a conference call with analysts. The company said last quarter that it planned to spend between $180 billion and $190 billion this year.
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Shares of the company were down more than 3% in extended trading. The stock was initially volatile but mostly flat, but dipped after Ashkenazi announced the capex update.
Revenue at Google Cloud rose 82% to $24.8 billion during the quarter ended June, accelerating from the 63% jump reported in the preceding three months. Analysts on average expected a 64% increase, according to data compiled by LSEG.
"We have increased our capacity quite significantly over the past three years. The demand still outpaces that investment," Ashkenazi said.
And while Google Cloud has made Alphabet a big beneficiary of the AI boom, the company's own AI efforts have lost some steam this year after it delayed the June launch of its next flagship model, Gemini 3.5 Pro.
That has left Google trailing in the AI coding tools market and fueled concerns on Wall Street, especially as Anthropic and OpenAI have consistently rolled out enterprise-focused upgrades, and Chinese open-source models have also gained strong traction.
"There are many attributes on which we are still at the frontier. There are areas where we've acknowledged we need to improve; coding and agentic coding is an example of that," CEO Sundar Pichai said on the call.
Adjusted profit per share of $2.85 fell slightly short of Wall Street projections of $2.89. Advertising revenue came in at $81.6 billion compared to estimates of $81.1 billion.
Total revenue for the quarter was $119.8 billion, beating the consensus estimate of $116.9 billion.
CLOUD GAINSGoogle began recognizing revenue from direct sales of its TPU chips, which compete with Nvidia's (NVDA.O), opens new tab GPUs, for the first time in the second quarter though the vast majority of revenue from business agreements would come through next year, Ashkenazi said.
The third-largest cloud services provider behind Amazon Web Services (AMZN.O), opens new tab and Microsoft (MSFT.O), opens new tab, Google has seen demand surge as companies race to secure the cloud capacity needed to develop, train and run AI models, helping it land major deals with firms, including Anthropic.
The robust cloud growth may ease some concerns over the company's hefty AI spending. Google has rapidly scaled up investments in data centers and advanced chips to build out its AI infrastructure, but investors have been worried whether the outlay would translate into sustainable revenue growth.
Big Tech is expected to spend well over $700 billion this year primarily on AI, while Morgan Stanley has pegged the estimated spend at more than $1 trillion for the next year.
Google's Search business has emerged as a bright spot, with the company's AI initiatives drawing more advertising dollars.
Features such as AI Overviews and AI Mode have helped boost overall search queries and drive deeper engagement by allowing users to execute longer, conversational searches. Google has capitalized on the strong usage by expanding ads within those AI features.
Alphabet shares have been among the best performers in the "Magnificent 7" group of stocks this year so far, rising nearly 11%. But concerns over the Gemini delays, some high-profile executive departures and regulatory pressures have dragged the stock about 9% lower since the end of April.
Rivals Microsoft and Amazon are set to report their quarterly earnings next week.
Reporting by Deborah Sophia in Bengaluru; Editing by Shilpi Majumdar and Aurora Ellis
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles., opens new tab
Kenrick Cai is a correspondent for Reuters based in San Francisco. He covers Google, its parent company Alphabet and artificial intelligence. Cai joined Reuters in 2024. He previously worked at Forbes magazine, where he was a staff writer covering venture capital and startups. He received a Best in Business award from the Society for Advancing Business Editing and Writing in 2023. He is a graduate of Duke University. Reach him on Signal at @kenrick.01.
YouTube ad revenue increased 13% in the second quarter compared with the same period a year ago, helping to pace parent Alphabet‘s financial performance.
Total revenue rose 24% in the quarter to hit $119.8 billion, while earnings per share nearly quadrupled to $9.11. Both metrics were ahead of Wall Street expectations.
YouTube pulled in $11.06 billion in ad revenue, showing double-digit growth that has eluded its traditional media rivals in recent years. Along with its deep well of creator content, YouTube is increasingly looking to cross over into traditional entertainment, landing rights to the Academy Awards and NFL football games.
RELATED: The NFL Wants To Attract Younger Fans; YouTube Blitzed Super Bowl LX To Try To Make That Happen
In the company’s earnings release, Google and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai flagged YouTube’s popularity as a way for people to keep current. “Month over month, people turn to YouTube for major world events, with over 1.7 billion unique viewers watching World Cup-related videos during the FIFA World Cup,” he wrote.
Debate about the stocks of Alphabet and the other “magnificent seven” tech giants (Nvidia, Apple, Amazon, Meta, Tesla and Microsoft) preceded the earnings release. Some Wall Streeters fret about a recent divergence between the “mag seven” and semiconductor shares, given that chipmakers have slumped recently despite their key role in the AI boom.
RELATED: UK Government Unveils Plan For Midnight Social Media Curfew For Older Teens
Google, initially a laggard in AI, has moved the head of the sector during the past few quarters, though it also faces questions about strategic plans for Gemini and other tools.
Yorkville Ives' Dan Ives and Requisite Capital's Bryn Talkington join 'Closing Bell' to discuss Ives' thoughts on Alphabet, the market appetite for capex and much more.
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Stock Market Rally Defies Rising Oil, Bond Yields; Chips Lead As Seagate, Micron Make Bullish Moves Google stock fell late Wednesday despite parent Alphabet (GOOGL) posting second-quarter earnings and revenue that topped Wall Street's targets thanks to better-than-expected growth in cloud computing. Meanwhile, Google's internet search ad revenue only met expectations. The internet giant reported Q2 results after the market close on Wednesday. Google earnings popped to $9.11 per share for the quarter ended June 30,…
Alphabet stock is trending. Where are GOOG shares going? Alphabet Q2 Earnings HighlightsAlphabet posted second-quarter revenue of approximately $119.80 billion, beating analyst estimates of $116.82 billion, according to Benzinga Pro.
The Google parent company reported second-quarter earnings of $9.11 per share, which may not compare to estimates. Alphabet said earnings were up 294% year-over-year.
Total revenue was up 24% on a year-over-year basis, driven by strong performance across the business. Here’s a breakdown of revenue by category.
Google Search: $63.27 billion, up from $54.19 billion year-over-year YouTube Advertising: $11.06 billion, up from $9.80 billion year-over-year Google Cloud: $24.77 billion, up from $13.62 billion year-over-year Google Advertising: $81.63 billion, up from $71.34 billion year-over-year “Our AI investments are redefining what’s possible across every part of our business,” said Sundar Pichai, CEO of Alphabet.
“Q2 was an amazing quarter, with Alphabet revenues growing 24% year-over-year and Google Cloud revenues accelerating to 82% growth, driven by demand for AI infrastructure and AI solutions. It’s great to see wide adoption of Gemini Enterprise, with nearly 90% of the Fortune 100 using it.”
Alphabet noted Gemini models now process 22 billion API tokens per minute and the Gemini app now has 950 million monthly active users.
Alphabet ended the quarter with approximately $242.47 billion in cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities.
Alphabet executives will further discuss the company’s quarterly results on an earnings call at 4:30 p.m. ET.
GOOG Shares Move Higher After the BellGOOG Price Action: Alphabet shares were up 1.39% in after-hours on Wednesday, trading at $346.67 at the time of publication, according to Benzinga Pro.
Image: Shutterstock.com
Market News and Data brought to you by Benzinga APIs
Alphabet Inc. reported second-quarter results that exceeded Wall Street expectations on earnings and revenue, driven by strong cloud growth, although its search advertising business narrowly missed analyst estimates.
The Google parent posted cloud revenue of $24.77 billion for the quarter ended June 30, an 82% increase from a year earlier and ahead of Bloomberg-compiled analyst estimates of $22.46 billion.
Search advertising revenue came in at $63.27 billion, slightly below expectations of $63.28 billion.
After stronger-than-expected quarterly performance, Alphabet GOOGL shares gained about 0.8% in after-hours trading on Wednesday after previously closing at $342.09 in New York.
Alphabet's cloud business remained a key driver of quarterly performance, delivering revenue well above analyst expectations.
Ahead of the release, analysts surveyed by LSEG had expected Alphabet to report second-quarter revenue of $116.93 billion, representing year-over-year growth of 21.3%.
Cloud revenue had been forecast to maintain growth of about 64%, while advertising revenue was expected to rise 13.7%.
The reported cloud sales of $24.77 billion grew by 82%, significantly exceeding estimates, reflecting continued demand for cloud services as enterprises expand artificial intelligence deployments.
However, search advertising revenue narrowly missed expectations, coming in just below consensus estimates.
The search business remains Alphabet's largest source of revenue, making its performance a closely watched metric for investors.
Earnings beat as AI spending remains under scrutinyAlphabet also reported adjusted earnings per share of $9.11, well above Wall Street's consensus estimate of $2.88 per share, according to FactSet. The result represented a 294% increase from the prior year.
The company is the first of the major US technology companies to report earnings this season, making its results an important indicator for the broader technology sector.
Investors have been closely monitoring whether Alphabet's growing investments in artificial intelligence are translating into stronger financial performance.
The company is expected to spend more than ever on capital expenditures this year as it competes in the AI race, with spending focused on data centers and AI infrastructure.
Investors remain focused on AI investment returnsAlthough Alphabet delivered stronger-than-expected earnings and cloud revenue, investors continue to assess whether the company's record AI spending will generate sustainable long-term growth.
The results are expected to intensify scrutiny of Alphabet's artificial intelligence strategy as Wall Street looks for evidence that higher capital expenditure is creating new revenue opportunities rather than reducing profitability.
Alphabet's earnings also set the tone for the broader technology sector, with several major companies scheduled to report in the coming days.
Many of the largest technology firms have collectively committed hundreds of billions of dollars toward AI infrastructure, making upcoming earnings reports an important test of whether those investments are beginning to deliver measurable returns.
Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:GOOG) reported second quarter results that exceeded Wall Street expectations, driven by accelerating growth in Google Cloud and continued strength across its search and advertising businesses.
The company reported revenue of $119.8 billion for the quarter ended June 30, up 24% from a year earlier and ahead of analysts' consensus estimate of approximately $116.8 billion.
Earnings per share came in at $9.11, well above the roughly $2.87 analysts had expected. The result was boosted by a significant unrealized gain on the company's equity investments, with other income totaling $98 billion during the quarter.
Google Cloud was a key driver of the outperformance, with revenue rising 82% year over year to $24.8 billion, surpassing the Street estimate of $22.3 billion. The company attributed the growth to demand for Google Cloud Platform across enterprise AI solutions, enterprise AI infrastructure, and its core cloud services.
Google Services revenue increased 15% to $94.5 billion, led by 17% growth in Google Search & other, 15% growth in subscriptions, platforms and devices, and 13% growth in YouTube advertising. YouTube advertising revenue totaled $11.06 billion, ahead of the $10.8 billion analysts had forecast.
Alphabet's operating income rose 30% from a year earlier, while operating margin expanded by two percentage points to 34%.
The company said the quarter marked its 12th consecutive period of double-digit revenue growth.
"Our AI investments are redefining what's possible across every part of our business," Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai said in the earnings release.
"Q2 was an amazing quarter, with Alphabet revenues growing 24% year-over-year and Google Cloud revenues accelerating to 82% growth, driven by demand for AI infrastructure and AI solutions. It's great to see wide adoption of Gemini Enterprise, with nearly 90% of the Fortune 100 using it."
Pichai added that the company's AI initiatives continued to gain traction across its businesses.
"We are seeing strong demand for our security solutions, and our new Gemini 3.5 Flash Cyber delivers highly cost-efficient performance at the frontier. And month over month, people turn to YouTube for major world events, with over 1.7 billion unique viewers watching World Cup-related videos during the FIFA World Cup 2026,” Pichai said.
"These outstanding results show that our differentiated, full stack approach to AI is delivering real, measurable value for consumers, customers, and our partners globally."
Shares of Alphabet traded down about 1% post-earnings.
Google's parent company, which has spent heavily on artificial intelligence, also showed growth across its businesses, particularly in cloud computing.
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Google CEO Sundar Pichai. Bloomberg/Getty Images Google's Gemini is nearing the big One Billion.
The company said on Wednesday that the Gemini AI app now has 950 million monthly active users. On the earnings call, CEO Sundar Pichai also said that daily active users have tripled in the past year.
That puts it close behind OpenAI's ChatGPT, which has around 1 billion monthly users per recent data from Sensor Tower.
To track Google's trajectory here, it said in October that the Gemini app was seeing around 650 million monthly active users. In February, reporting its Q4 2025 earnings, Google said that figure had risen to over 750 million.
Google has been rolling out more cost-friendly and faster models. This week, it rolled out three models, including its Gemini 3.6 Flash model, which the company said is better at tasks such as coding than its predecessor while using fewer tokens, making it more cost-effective.
Google's new frontier 3.5 Pro model is still delayed, even as Google this week teased that early work on Gemini 4 had started. These latest user numbers on Gemini suggest that it's still scooping up users quite nicely.
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Hugh Langley You're currently following this author! Want to unfollow? Unsubscribe via the link in your email.
SummaryAlphabet Inc. is a cash-generating giant with $422B TTM revenue and $160B net profit, trading at a discounted 24x forward P/E.GOOGL's heavy capital expenditures, driven by AI infrastructure buildout, currently suppress free cash flow and investor sentiment.I foresee a structural shift toward AI optimization, reducing future capex and unleashing substantial free cash flow for buybacks or dividends.I rate GOOGL a Buy, expecting rerating toward Apple’s multiples as capex normalizes and regulatory/macroeconomic risks remain manageable. Jonathan Kitchen/DigitalVision via Getty Images
An Empire Generating Real Money If we look at the current indicators of Alphabet Inc. (GOOG, GOOGL), we will see not simply a successful IT company. The fresh Q2 2026 report shows consolidated
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Analyst’s Disclosure: I/we have no stock, option or similar derivative position in any of the companies mentioned, and no plans to initiate any such positions within the next 72 hours. I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it (other than from Seeking Alpha). I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article.
Seeking Alpha's Disclosure: Past performance is no guarantee of future results. No recommendation or advice is being given as to whether any investment is suitable for a particular investor. Any views or opinions expressed above may not reflect those of Seeking Alpha as a whole. Seeking Alpha is not a licensed securities dealer, broker or US investment adviser or investment bank. Our analysts are third party authors that include both professional investors and individual investors who may not be licensed or certified by any institute or regulatory body.
První zástupce big techu se v aktuální výsledkové sezoně vytasil se silnými čísly. Alphabet překonal svým hospodařením za druhé čtvrtletí odhady analytiků jak v případě zisku, tak i tržeb. Výrazně lépe oproti očekávání si vedla také cloudová divize, jejíž tempo růstu nadále prudce zrychluje. Mírným zklamáním naopak je hlavní byznys spojený s internetovým vyhledáváním.
Nejprve k hlavním číslům: Upravený zisk na akcii činil 9,11 dolaru, což je výrazné překročení prognózy Wall Street ve výši 2,90 dolarů. Stojí za tím masivní zisky v kategorii „ostatní příjmy“ ve výši bezmála 98 miliard dolarů, které zahrnují podíly ve společnostech Anthropic a SpaceX. Celkové tržby vzrostly meziročně o 24 procent na 119,80 miliardy dolarů při konsenzu 116,9 mld. USD.
Investory bedlivě sledovaná cloudová divize, jež odráží poptávku po AI infrastruktuře a AI řešeních, se rovněž činila, když na tržbách vygenerovala 24,77 miliardy dolarů, což jednak představuje působivý meziroční růst o 82 procent a jednak výrazné překonání konsenzu analytiků, kteří podle dat agentury Bloomberg počítali s tržbami „jen“ kolem 22,46 mld. USD.
Měsíční počet aktivních uživatelů aplikace Gemini dosáhl 950 milionů, což je oproti odhadům o 30 milionů více. „Gemini je nyní jen kousek od toho, aby se stal třetím produktem od Googlu s umělou inteligencí pro spotřebitele s miliardou uživatelů, vedle AI Overviews a AI Mode,“ podotkl pro Bloomberg hlavní analytik společnosti Emarketer Nate Elliott.
Naopak reklamní příjmy z vyhledávání, které jsou nadále nejvýznamnějším zdrojem tržeb společnosti, dosáhly 63,27 miliardy dolarů. To je nepatrně pod očekáváním trhu (63,28 mld. USD).
Společnost dále uvedla, že kapitálové výdaje ve druhém čtvrtletí dosáhly 44,92 miliardy dolarů, což překonalo očekávání Wall Street (44,15 mld. USD). Alphabet letos plánuje rekordní kapitálové výdaje, aby mohl soutěžit v závodě umělé inteligence, přičemž investoři (nejen Alphabetu, nýbrž technologických gigantů obecně) sledují, zda tyto výdaje pohánějí nový růst, nebo v konečném důsledku omezí ziskovost.
Akcie Alphabetu bezprostředně po zveřejnění výsledků v aftermarketu ztrácely přibližně půl procenta.
Alphabet reports after the closing bell tonight. Q2 '26 GOOGL rev estimate - $127 bl (gross revenue), while the sell-side seems to be around $100 bl – $102 bl for the net revenue. Free cash flow estimated per LSEG for Q3 and Q4 '25 - $6.7 billion and $2.2 bl, respectively.
Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:GOOG) reports second-quarter results after Wednesday's close, with Wall Street bracing for a print that could either validate the company's AI spending spree or intensify investor unease about it.
Bank of America is firmly in the bullish camp, reiterating its Buy rating and raising earnings estimates ahead of the print. The bank projects revenue of $102.1 billion and EPS of $8.38, both well above Street consensus of $101 billion and $2.90.
Much of that EPS gap traces to an estimated $80 billion boost to operating income from the revaluation of Alphabet's stake in Anthropic, whose valuation climbed from $380 billion in the first quarter to $965 billion in the second.
Beyond the accounting windfall, the bank sees genuine operating strength: search growth of 17%, cloud growth accelerating to 70%, and a cloud backlog supporting at least $230 billion in revenue over the next eight quarters. Consensus estimates put Q2 revenue closer to $116.8 billion, with cloud revenue growing roughly 63% to over $21 billion.
Capital spending remains the swing factor. Alphabet already guided full-year 2026 capex to $180 billion to $190 billion, and Bank of America thinks that range could climb another 5%, to $190 billion to $200 billion, given accelerating AI demand and rising memory costs.
That spending question is exactly what's rattling some market watchers. Ipek Ozkardeskaya, senior analyst at Swissquote, argues the real story isn't Alphabet's AI models but its infrastructure.
"Alphabet was battered after reports that the latest update to its Gemini model would be delayed by several months. But I believe Alphabet's real winning trade is not its AI model, it is its data centres, TPU chips and its ability to monetise them," she said. "It should not, however, double down on infrastructure spending. Even a comfortable earnings beat may not be enough to bring investors back if AI spending continues to run against investors' desire to see it contained."
Patrick Munnelly, partner for market strategy at Tickmill Group, sees this print as a referendum on capex discipline broadly.
"Alphabet (is) now the next key test for capex appetite and cloud/AI monetisation," he said. "The market does not need perfection, but it does need evidence that spending intentions remain intact and that AI infrastructure demand is not slowing at the margin. After last week's valuation scare, guidance matters more than narrative."
With Gemini 4 slated for a fall launch and new agentic search features from I/O still rolling out, investors will be listening for guidance as closely as the headline numbers.
Alphabet shares were trading modestly higher, up 0.3% before its earnings release.
Image Credits:Google Google announced on Wednesday a new migration experience built directly into Android 17 that should ease the switch from iPhone to Android. The feature lets users wirelessly transfer more data types from an iPhone without needing to download a separate app, Google says.
By simplifying the onboarding process and supporting more data types, the tech giant is looking to lower the barriers to switching smartphone ecosystems as it aims to attract more iPhone users.
With this new method, users can transfer photos, videos, contacts, messages, calendars, and newly supported data types, including their Google Account, passwords, Wi-Fi credentials, and even their eSIM, when switching from an iPhone to Android.
The upgrade has already started rolling out to select Pixel devices, and it’s also available on the new Samsung Galaxy Z Flip8 and Z Fold8 series, which were unveiled today. The new migration method will also come to more Android devices soon, Google says.
Alphabet (GOOG +0.00%)(GOOGL -0.13%) reports second-quarter results after the market closes today, with the earnings call scheduled for 4:30 p.m. ET. The revenue and earnings may end up being the focus on many of the headlines. But I'd argue the number that actually has more implications for the stock sits further down the report. It's capital expenditures -- the money Alphabet is pouring into data centers and the computing infrastructure behind its artificial intelligence (AI) push.
After all, nobody doubts that the business is growing. The question is whether the company's AI spending is an investment compounding into more growth or a cost rising faster than the returns it generates.
Image source: Alphabet.
The spending curve keeps steepening In April, alongside first-quarter results, Alphabet raised its 2026 capital expenditure guidance to a range of $180 billion to $190 billion, up from $175 billion to $185 billion. Chief financial officer Anat Ashkenazi also said the company expects its 2027 capital expenditures to "significantly increase" from there.
And Alphabet spent $35.7 billion on capital expenditures during Q1 specifically. So, even to reach even the low end of its full-year range, spending would need to average about $48 billion per quarter for the rest of the year -- a step-up of more than 30% from the first quarter's pace.
To be fair, the tech company's growth has been impressive. Alphabet's first-quarter revenue rose 22% year over year to $109.9 billion, the company's 11th consecutive quarter of double-digit growth. Google Cloud revenue climbed 63% year over year to $20 billion -- an acceleration that made the segment the company's most powerful growth catalyst. And Alphabet notably said its cloud backlog swelled to more than $460 billion.
Further, Alphabet remains compute-constrained.
"We are compute constrained in the near term," CEO Sundar Pichai said in the company's first-quarter earnings call. "Our cloud revenue would have been higher if we were able to meet the demand."
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What would be reassuring -- and what wouldn't As for the earnings line, it has gotten noisy recently. Alphabet's first-quarter net income rose 81% year over year, but a $36.9 billion pre-tax gain on equity securities added $28.7 billion to the bottom line, a swing factor that has nothing to do with the operating business. That's exactly why profit is a poor scoreboard for this report, and the capital expenditure line is a better one.
So what would a reassuring report look like?
Capital expenditure guidance held at $180 billion to $190 billion, cloud growth still running near 60%, and clear evidence that the more than $460 billion cloud backlog is converting into revenue. That combination would say the spending is buying growth at a steady exchange rate.
The worrying version is the opposite. Another guidance raise stacked on top of April's, paired with decelerating cloud growth, would suggest the price of keeping up in AI is rising faster than the payoff. Investors could probably forgive either one on its own. Both together, however, could hit the stock hard.
Valuation frames the stakes. At about $347 per share, Alphabet trades at about 27 times earnings -- closer to 32 times without the first quarter's equity gains, but hardly extreme either way for a company growing revenue 22%. Shares also sit about 15% below their 52-week high of $408.61, so some caution is already priced in.
But a multiple like that still assumes Alphabet's strong growth persists as its investments pay off.
Alphabet has earned patience from investors on this front before. Google Cloud spent years absorbing investment before it became the profit driver it is now, and the company's balance sheet gives it more room for error than almost any business on Earth. The bull case, therefore, is simply that history repeats: spend heavily, wait, collect a bigger business on the other side.
Ultimately, the report lands this afternoon, and the reaction will come fast. When it does, I'll go straight past revenue and earnings to the capital expenditure line -- and I think investors should, too. If Alphabet holds the range while cloud keeps compounding, the stock's premium valuation looks earned. But if the spending number jumps again without growth to match, investors may have some cause for concern.
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Google CEO Sundar Pichai is likely to face questions about its delayed frontier AI during earnings. Bloomberg/Getty Images In the AI race, the throne is never safe. Just ask Google.
After the success of Gemini 3, Google found itself in a strong position at the end of 2025. As of this week, the situation is a little shakier.
While the company just rolled out three faster, more cost-effective models, it continues to delay its next frontier model, Gemini 3.5 Pro, and it's unclear whether this week's launches will be enough to keep users and investors happy in the interim.
Some of Google's competitors are using the opportunity to land a few jabs.
Alexandr Wang, Meta's chief AI officer, wrote on X "gemini who?" in response to a leaderboard that ranked Meta's Spark model above one launched by Google this week.
Thibault Sottiaux, a member of technical staff at OpenAI, also took an apparent jab at the search giant. In a post on X, Google's Logan Kilpatrick announced that pre-training on Gemini 4 — the next big milestone model — had begun. "Hope it finishes one day too!" Sottiaux replied.
Google declined to comment.
'Too early to count anyone out'Google's delay is particularly glaring because OpenAI and Anthropic have rolled out new top-tier models in recent weeks. The pushback of Gemini 3.5 Pro has "shifted perception from leading edge to trailing edge," said Josh Beck, an analyst at Raymond James, in a note this week. He said he saw this as a byproduct of the fast pace of change among the labs right now.
At the same time, Google's business has been humming along nicely in recent quarters, with strong momentum across Search, YouTube, Cloud, and other areas benefiting from Google's AI advancements. Google is also betting that faster, more cost-effective models may be a winning strategy at a time when token costs are racking up.
Google's focus on more efficient models has received praise from some users.
"Google gets a lot of criticism on here for falling behind on agentic coding, but Gemini 3.5 Flash has long been my daily driver for agentic document extraction, which is one of the highest-value use-cases for LLMs IMO," Kyle Walker, founder of Clearfork Intelligence, wrote on X.
Still, Google may need to address this trade-off between efficiency and power when it announces Q2 earnings on Wednesday evening. Analysts are likely to raise the topic of 3.5 Pro and its release timeline.
"I love Gemini, probably more than I should but them hyping 4 before even delivering 3.5 Pro is a lil weird," Anshel Sag, analyst at Moor Insights & Strategy, wrote on X.
Sag told Business Insider he felt that Google hyping up Gemini 4 was an "admission they already have something better." However, he said the "feverish pace" of AI right now doesn't necessarily yield meaningful improvements.
"I just feel like Google is a much bigger company and moves a bit differently from its competitors," said Sag.
He added: "It's just way too early to count anyone out."
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