Alphabet Shares Slide as AI Spending Concerns and Waymo Recalls Weigh on Stock

Alphabet shares fell sharply Monday morning, with the Class C shares dropping 5.32% to $347.92, extending a month-long slide that has left the tech giant underperforming the broader market amid persistent investor anxiety over the scale of its artificial intelligence spending and a string of operational setbacks at its self-driving unit.

A Stock Under Sustained Pressure

Alphabet shares have dropped 6.3% over the past month, underperforming the broader Zacks Computer & Technology sector’s return of 3.6% over the same period. The company’s huge capital expenditure plan — between $180 billion and $190 billion for 2026, roughly double 2025’s level, with spending expected to rise further in 2027 — has spooked investors.

Why the Spending Plan Worries Wall Street

The core tension driving investor concern centers on whether the enormous capital outlay will ultimately pay off. The question that investors are asking is whether the returns from AI investments will justify the enormous upfront costs. Most of Alphabet’s capital expenditure is marked for building AI and cloud infrastructure, including data centers, chips, and servers for Gemini and cloud growth.

That spending is already squeezing the company’s free cash flow even as overall cash generation remains substantial. Although Alphabet generates considerable cash flow — $174.4 billion on a trailing 12-month basis at the end of the first quarter of 2026 — the steep increase in capital expenditure is expected to squeeze free cash flow, which stood at $64.4 billion on a trailing 12-month basis over the same period.

A Dilutive Equity Raise Adds to the Pressure

Beyond the spending itself, Alphabet has also taken steps to finance its AI buildout that carry direct consequences for existing shareholders. Alphabet announced plans to raise approximately $84.75 billion through equity offerings to fund AI infrastructure spending that dilutes existing shareholders’ stakes — a move that has added to the cautious sentiment surrounding the stock in recent weeks.

The Wiz Acquisition’s Margin Impact

Alphabet’s cloud business is also facing near-term profitability headwinds tied to a recent acquisition. The Wiz acquisition is expected to have a low single-digit percentage point headwind to Google Cloud’s operating margin for the remainder of 2026, adding another factor weighing on near-term earnings even as the deal is expected to strengthen the company’s cybersecurity offerings over the longer term.

Capacity Constraints Despite Rapid Buildout

Despite the massive spending commitment, Alphabet’s cloud business has also faced operational limitations in keeping pace with demand. The company is suffering from capacity constraints despite the improving pace of server deployments and data center construction. This, along with higher depreciation expenses and related data center operations costs, including energy, is expected to hurt profitability.

Waymo’s Robotaxi Recalls Add to the Pressure

Beyond the financial concerns surrounding AI spending, Alphabet’s self-driving unit has also generated negative headlines in recent days. Waymo, the self-driving vehicle unit of tech giant Alphabet, is recalling over 3,800 robotaxis in the U.S. after a software glitch caused more than a dozen of its vehicles to drive into freeway construction zones. The self-driving car company is recalling certain fifth-generation automated driving systems after a number of events in which its cars didn’t recognize and drove past ramp-closure signs into pre-planned construction areas.

Waymo has recalled its fleet of nearly 4,000 robotaxis to restrict them from driving on highways while it figures out how to make the vehicles behave around construction zones. Despite the recall, data still shows a reduction in serious accidents with the company’s robotaxis overall, suggesting the underlying safety trend remains positive even as the specific software issue gets addressed.

A Notable Departure From Google’s AI Team

Adding to the list of concerns weighing on the stock, Alphabet has also faced renewed scrutiny over talent retention within its core AI research division. Google Gemini co-lead Noam Shazeer announced his departure to ChatGPT maker OpenAI, raising concerns about future performance in AI development at a moment when competition for top AI research talent across the industry remains intense.

Where the Bull Case Still Stands

Despite the recent weakness, several elements of Alphabet’s underlying business have continued performing well, giving some analysts reason for continued optimism. Alphabet’s prospects are benefiting from its growing AI-powered Search capabilities and significant investments in cloud computing. Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai has highlighted enterprise AI as a main growth driver, with revenue from generative AI products soaring nearly 800% year-over-year.

The company’s competitive position in search has also remained essentially unchallenged. In the search domain, Google continues to dominate with a roughly 90.39% share, followed by Microsoft’s Bing, with a 5.03% share. In cloud computing, Amazon maintained a strong lead in the market, though Microsoft and Alphabet’s Google continued to achieve substantially higher growth rates, with market shares of roughly 28%, 21%, and 14% respectively among the three providers.

A Valuation That Some See as Stretched

Despite the recent pullback in share price, at least one widely followed valuation framework suggests Alphabet shares may not yet be cheap relative to historical norms. Alphabet shares are considered overvalued, as suggested by a Value Score of D. The stock is trading at a forward 12-month price-to-earnings ratio of 25.73 times, compared with the broader Zacks Internet Services Industry’s 24.98 times.

Multiple Paths to Future Growth

Analysts following the company continue to point to a diverse range of potential revenue streams tied to its AI investments as a basis for longer-term optimism, even amid near-term spending concerns. AI creates multiple monetization pathways for Alphabet beyond traditional search advertising through AI-powered advertising tools such as AI Max and Performance Max. Other options include consumer AI subscriptions through Google One and Gemini plans, enterprise AI infrastructure and model services, agentic commerce initiatives such as Universal Cart, as well as AI-driven productivity and developer platforms like Antigravity.

The Zacks Consensus Estimate for 2026 earnings is pegged at $14.30 per share, indicating 32.3% year-over-year growth, suggesting analysts still expect meaningful profit growth even as the company absorbs its historically large capital spending commitments.

With Alphabet’s massive AI infrastructure buildout continuing to draw mixed reactions from investors, and with the Waymo recall and recent AI talent departure adding fresh near-term headlines, the stock’s trajectory in the coming weeks will likely depend heavily on whether the company’s cloud growth and AI-driven search improvements continue outpacing the costs associated with that spending. Given the scale of capital expenditure planned through 2027, market participants are likely to continue scrutinizing each quarterly earnings report closely for evidence that Alphabet’s AI investments are translating into durable revenue growth rather than simply compressing near-term margins and free cash flow.