Wall Street Zen Downgrades Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) to Hold

03 Aug 2026, 07:00 by Kim Johansen · The Markets Daily

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL – Get Free Report) was downgraded by stock analysts at Wall Street Zen from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report issued on Saturday.

Several other equities analysts have also issued reports on GOOGL. Barclays restated an “overweight” rating and set a $425.00 target price (up from $405.00) on shares of Alphabet in a research report on Thursday, July 23rd. JPMorgan Chase & Co. reiterated a “buy” rating on shares of Alphabet in a research report on Monday, May 4th. Pivotal Research reissued a “buy” rating and set a $475.00 price objective (up from $470.00) on shares of Alphabet in a research note on Thursday, July 23rd. BMO Capital Markets set a $465.00 price objective on shares of Alphabet and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday, July 23rd. Finally, Royal Bank Of Canada restated an “outperform” rating and set a $425.00 price objective on shares of Alphabet in a report on Thursday, July 23rd. Six research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, forty-four have assigned a Buy rating and four have issued a Hold rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Buy” and an average target price of $419.86.

View Our Latest Stock Analysis on GOOGL

Alphabet Price Performance

Shares of Alphabet stock opened at $356.13 on Friday. The company has a quick ratio of 2.64, a current ratio of 2.72 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.16. Alphabet has a 12 month low of $187.82 and a 12 month high of $408.61. The business has a fifty day simple moving average of $357.79 and a 200 day simple moving average of $339.35. The stock has a market cap of $4.36 trillion, a PE ratio of 17.89, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.00 and a beta of 1.24.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL – Get Free Report) last released its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, July 22nd. The information services provider reported $9.11 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.89 by $6.22. Alphabet had a return on equity of 51.32% and a net margin of 54.77%.The business had revenue of $119.80 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $117.07 billion. Research analysts predict that Alphabet will post 20.51 EPS for the current year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, major shareholder 2019 Gp L.L.C. Gv sold 118,138 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, July 28th. The stock was sold at an average price of $18.90, for a total transaction of $2,232,808.20. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, Director Frances Arnold sold 82 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, July 30th. The stock was sold at an average price of $333.39, for a total transaction of $27,337.98. Following the sale, the director owned 18,914 shares in the company, valued at $6,305,738.46. This trade represents a 0.43% decrease in their ownership of the stock. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. Insiders sold a total of 600,547 shares of company stock valued at $16,255,540 in the last quarter. 11.61% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Alphabet

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in GOOGL. Norges Bank bought a new stake in Alphabet in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $30,534,239,000. Cardano Risk Management B.V. lifted its position in shares of Alphabet by 855.3% in the fourth quarter. Cardano Risk Management B.V. now owns 14,525,280 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $4,546,413,000 after buying an additional 13,004,828 shares during the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its stake in shares of Alphabet by 2.4% during the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 528,969,322 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $165,567,398,000 after acquiring an additional 12,531,695 shares during the period. Capital World Investors boosted its stake in shares of Alphabet by 28.0% during the 3rd quarter. Capital World Investors now owns 53,107,572 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $12,910,542,000 after acquiring an additional 11,605,785 shares during the period. Finally, Diamant Asset Management Inc. boosted its stake in shares of Alphabet by 28,950.0% during the 1st quarter. Diamant Asset Management Inc. now owns 9,291,926 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $2,671,986,000 after acquiring an additional 9,259,940 shares during the period. 40.03% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Key Stories Impacting Alphabet

Here are the key news stories impacting Alphabet this week:

Positive Sentiment: Alphabet’s custom Tensor Processing Units (TPUs) are increasingly viewed as credible alternatives to Nvidia chips. That could reduce Google’s dependence on external suppliers and create a potential external chip-revenue opportunity. Alphabet and Amazon custom AI chips
Positive Sentiment: Recent commentary highlights Alphabet’s record quarter, strong Google Cloud growth, Gemini adoption and enterprise AI demand. Analysts and value-focused investors continue to view GOOGL as comparatively inexpensive among large technology and AI companies. Alphabet AI investment and valuation
Positive Sentiment: Google is reportedly supporting a $15 billion Anthropic data-center project with chips and financial guarantees, while Oracle is expanding its partnership to bring Gemini models to enterprise applications. These initiatives could drive Google Cloud demand and strengthen Alphabet’s AI ecosystem. Anthropic data center backed by Google
Neutral Sentiment: Alphabet’s reported quarterly earnings and revenue beat consensus estimates by wide margins, supporting the fundamental case, although investors remain focused on whether AI growth will translate into sufficient cash returns.
Negative Sentiment: Alphabet withdrew its Google Earth AI image-generation feature only one day after launch following criticism that fabricated imagery could spread misinformation. The quick reversal limits immediate product risk but raises questions about AI governance and rollout discipline. Google Earth AI feature withdrawn
Negative Sentiment: The AI buildout is becoming increasingly expensive. Alphabet is targeting up to $205 billion in 2026 capital expenditures, while rising memory and infrastructure costs are pressuring cash flow and increasing future depreciation. AI buildout costs and cash flow
Negative Sentiment: Recent insider sales were small relative to the executives’ remaining holdings, but they provide a modest sentiment headwind. Separately, investor-law-firm investigations could create additional legal and reputational overhang. Alphabet director stock sale

About Alphabet

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Alphabet Inc is the holding company created in 2015 to organize Google and a portfolio of businesses developing technologies beyond Google’s core internet services. Its principal operations are led by Google, which builds and operates consumer-facing products such as Google Search, YouTube, Android, Chrome, Gmail, Google Maps and Google Workspace, as well as advertising platforms (Google Ads and AdSense) that historically generate the majority of its revenue. Google also develops consumer hardware (Pixel phones, Nest smart-home devices, Chromecast) and developer and distribution platforms such as Google Play.