Alphabet Halts Buybacks, Invests $40 Billion in Anthropic and Massive AI Infrastructure
Alphabet (GOOGL) has ended a decade-long share buyback program, repurchasing no stock in Q1 2026 for the first time in ten years, after returning nearly $300 billion to shareholders over the past five years. Instead, the company is redirecting cash into AI infrastructure, with capital expenditures rising 107% YoY to $35.67 billion in Q1, and full-year capex guided between $175-185 billion. In a major strategic move, Alphabet also acquired a $40 billion stake in rival AI lab Anthropic, hedging its in-house Gemini development. The success of this pivot hinges on Google Cloud's performance, with analysts expecting 70% YoY growth to validate the reallocation. Shares have slipped 5.67% over the past month but remain up 83.14% over the last year. Prediction markets assign a 96.3% probability of an earnings beat.
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Alphabet Halts Buybacks, Invests $40 Billion in Anthropic and Massive AI Infrastructure
Alphabet (GOOGL) has ended a decade-long share buyback program, repurchasing no stock in Q1 2026 for the first time in ten years, after returning nearly $300 billion to shareholders over the past five years. Instead, the company is redirecting cash into AI infrastructure, with capital expenditures rising 107% YoY to $35.67 billion in Q1, and full-year capex guided between $175-185 billion. In a major strategic move, Alphabet also acquired a $40 billion stake in rival AI lab Anthropic, hedging its in-house Gemini development. The success of this pivot hinges on Google Cloud's performance, with analysts expecting 70% YoY growth to validate the reallocation. Shares have slipped 5.67% over the past month but remain up 83.14% over the last year. Prediction markets assign a 96.3% probability of an earnings beat.