We recently published a list of 10 Biggest AI Stories and Ratings Updates You Should Not Miss This Week. Since Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) ranks 4th on the list, it deserves a deeper look.
The Federal Reserve now expects just one rate cut in this year, and the market’s reaction to this development has been calmer-than-expected, showing investors are now paying little to no attention to what the Fed does and instead have their eyes focused on AI, which continues to push the markets higher. Tech companies, small and large, are continuing to roll out AI-focused products and solutions, while funds are pouring billions into AI. SoftBank has recently committed another $5 billion in AI investments for 5 companies ($1 billion each). A Wall Street Journal report cited SoftBank’s CFO, who said the bank’s chief Masayoshi Son was taking a “break from quarterly earnings meetings so he could focus on AI.”
In this backdrop it’s important to stay ahead of the curve and see what’s happening in the AI space.
In this article we will take a look at some of the biggest AI stock ratings updates and stories which can’t be missed. We focused on AI stocks that are popular among the smart money investors. Why are we interested in the stocks that hedge funds pile into? The reason is simple: our research has shown that we can outperform the market by imitating the top stock picks of the best hedge funds. Our quarterly newsletter’s strategy selects 14 small-cap and large-cap stocks every quarter and has returned 275% since May 2014, beating its benchmark by 150 percentage points (see more details here).
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Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:GOOG)
Number of Hedge Fund Investors: 165
Bank of America analyst Michael Hartnett last week pointed to the concentration of gains phenomenon on the market, saying if we remove the “Big Ten” stocks from the equation, the S&P 500’s gain so far this year shrinks to just 3.6%. This “Big Ten” group also includes Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:GOOG).
Another latest story around Alphabet Inc Class C (NASDAQ:GOOG) making waves is Bank of America’s industry checks in the search engine market which found that Alphabet is still the market leader, with a whopping 95% share, with Bing’s search coming in at just 0.7%.
BofA’s Justin Post said Alphabet Inc’s (NASDAQ:GOOG) AI Overviews had a role to play here:
“After a consecutive eight months of decline, Google’s US Search market share increased m/m in May, which could suggest AI Overviews are aiding query growth and usage,” Post said.
Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) bulls believe the market is not incorporating Alphabet Inc.’s (NASDAQ:GOOG) growth in Cloud, Other Bets, Video and other high growth initiatives. The stock is trading 20x Alphabet Inc.’s (NASDAQ:GOOG) 2025 EPS estimate of $8.57. This multiple makes the stock look attractively valued since the Wall Street expects Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) earnings to grow by 13.40% in 2025 and by 19% over the past five years on a per annum basis.
Lakehouse Global Growth Fund stated the following regarding Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) in its April 2024 investor letter:
“Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) delivered a strong quarterly result that came in well ahead of analysts’ expectations. Revenue grew 15.4% (16.0% constant currency) to $80.5 billion and operating income grew 46.0% to $25.5 billion. Revenue growth accelerated across Search, YouTube Ads, and Google Cloud, all whilst the company delivered its highest operating margin since 2021 – showing meaningful progress in the company’s efforts to durably re-work their cost structure. On the Generative AI front, management emphasised the company’s infrastructure advantages including 5th generation TPUs(chips developed by Google specifically for AI training and inference), high performance data centre architecture, and AI models that are 100x more efficient versus 18 months ago. Overall, we believe that Alphabet is well placed for the AI opportunity ahead and still has significant latent earnings power. When combined with a relatively undemanding valuation of 21x forward net profit and over $100 billion of cash on the balance sheet, it’s not hard to see why we remain positive on the range of outcomes in the years ahead.”
Overall, Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) ranks 4th on Insider Monkey’s list titled 10 Biggest AI Stories and Ratings Updates You Should Not Miss This Week. While we acknowledge the potential Alphabet, our conviction lies in the belief that under the radar AI stocks hold greater promise for delivering higher returns, and doing so within a shorter timeframe. If you are looking for an AI stock that is more promising than GOOG but that trades at less than 5 times its earnings, check out our report about the cheapest AI stock.
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Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.