Google parent company Alphabet Inc advanced nearer to joining peers Apple Inc and Microsoft Corp in the elite $2 trillion market valuation club on Wednesday as the search giant’s shares surged more than 8% following a blowout quarterly report.
The last trading at about $2,975, Alphabet’s stock was on track for its largest one-day percentage gain in almost two years, easing concerns around owning Big Tech following a sector-wide selloff in the past few weeks.
Alphabet’s stock market value peaked just above $2 trillion after the start of the trading session and was last at $1.97 trillion. That includes class B shares that do not trade on the stock market and are held by insiders.
A close above $2 trillion would be the first-ever for the Mountain View, California-based company.
“The technology sector started 2022 with some of the biggest question marks over it since the dot-com crash more than two decades ago,” said Russ Mould, investment director at AJ Bell. “However, the largest and highest quality US tech names continue to deliver the answers the market wants with big earnings beats.”
Shares of Wall Street’s most valuable companies have soared in the past two years, driven by pandemic-led shifts in how people work and learn, even as regulators around the world scrutinize them over allegations of breaches of privacy and antitrust concerns.
At least 20 brokerages raised their price targets on Alphabet’s stock after the company late on Tuesday delivered record quarterly sales that topped expectations. The median analyst price target is now $3,450, 16% above its current price.
