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Alphabet Becomes the Most Valuable Public Company in the World

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Re: Alphabet Becomes the Most Valuable Public Company in the World

#101

Post by AnthonyMouse »

tyingq wrote: post #33
Lewisham wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

...or Google is just getting better at serving the right advertisement at the right time?

They are getting better, every single year, over more than a decade, in a way that click growth outpaces traffic growth. Despite circumstances that would counter the effort. It seems unlikely it's just targeting, without spilling over into something that's bad for consumers.

> They are getting better, every single year, over more than a decade, in a way that click growth outpaces traffic growth.

That they're getting better at it is why click growth outpaces traffic growth. If they stayed the same at it then click growth would equal traffic growth.

> It seems unlikely it's just targeting, without spilling over into something that's bad for consumers.

It could be one or the other or both. Care to present any evidence or reasoning as to why we should make one conclusion or the other?

Re: Alphabet Becomes the Most Valuable Public Company in the World

#102

Post by tyingq »

HappyTypist wrote: post #84
jfuhrman wrote: post #25

Well, abusing their search dominance among other things like making ads indistinguishable from organic results and paid placement on verticals like shopping/hotels etc. was eventually going to pay out. More details on how Google manipulated search rankings manually to make more money: From http://www.wsj.com/articles/how-google-skewed-search-results... >A previously undisclosed report by staffers at the Federal Trade…

Google's purpose is to give users the most relevant results. No Google algorithm update goes through without users liking it; it doesn't matter how much profitability it increases.

The parent of your response points to an FTC report (an internal one that was leaked).

Within that report, they show how Google was able to tweak the questions until end users stopped liking something they did like with the previous set of questions.

The questions being tweaked were specifically about a type of site that competed with Froogle/Google Shopping that Google wanted demoted.

Re: Alphabet Becomes the Most Valuable Public Company in the World

#103

Post by dragonwriter »

tyingq wrote: post #28
ghayes wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> b) The shift from desktop to mobile should have the effect of reducing clicks. Can you clarify this statement?

If you're an advertiser, you've already seen this. Mobile viewers click on ads less often than desktop viewers. So, absent any other variables...if mobile traffic is growing faster than desktop traffic, year over year, click growth would slow.

> Mobile viewers click on ads less often than desktop viewers.

> So, absent any other variables...if mobile traffic is growing faster than desktop traffic, year over year, click growth would slow.

Sure, assuming that actual total traffic growth is constant; if desktop to mobile transition accelerates overall traffic growth, the increase in mobile traffic can be enough to even at a lower click/traffic rate increase total clicks.

Re: Alphabet Becomes the Most Valuable Public Company in the World

#104

Post by jfuhrman »

HappyTypist wrote: post #84
jfuhrman wrote: post #25

Well, abusing their search dominance among other things like making ads indistinguishable from organic results and paid placement on verticals like shopping/hotels etc. was eventually going to pay out. More details on how Google manipulated search rankings manually to make more money: From http://www.wsj.com/articles/how-google-skewed-search-results... >A previously undisclosed report by staffers at the Federal Trade…

Google's purpose is to give users the most relevant results. No Google algorithm update goes through without users liking it; it doesn't matter how much profitability it increases.

That reads like sarcasm, but I am not 100% sure.

Re: Alphabet Becomes the Most Valuable Public Company in the World

#105

Post by bdcravens »

SilasX wrote: post #90

Out of curiosity, is there a reason Google/Alphabet shouldn't be on the Dow?

No, but who would it replace? Apple was only added last year, and there isn't that much turnover on it. There currently are no pure online companies on there, and despite the role of tech in today's world, only a few companies in the space (MSFT, Cisco, Apple, IBM)

Re: Alphabet Becomes the Most Valuable Public Company in the World

#106

Post by gefh »

whack wrote: post #76

Kudos to Google. I'm happy for them. But it's also worth pointing out that Market Cap is a horrendous way to measure how "valuable" or "powerful" a company is. Companies A and B both want to raise $10B to fund a new investment opportunity. A decides to issue corporate bonds, because it doesn't want to dilute its shareholders. B decides to issue new equity instead, because they feel that their company stock is actuall…

Scenario 1: B's existing public equity and future EPS is diluted by the new issue, and the market cap should remain similar. Scenario 2: A's share price now has a dividend stream implying future returns, which will increase the future value of the shares. Yes, the market cap will drop by $15B on the dividend date, but two similarly performing companies, one paying predictable dividends, and one not, should already be priced differently. I'll concede that the modern practice of just not paying dividends complicates this a bit, and biases the pricing toward pure speculation.

Re: Alphabet Becomes the Most Valuable Public Company in the World

#107

Post by draw_down »

lern_too_spel wrote: post #43
draw_down wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the other hand, that product stance helps them avoid Google Reader-type situations.

Right, it gets them into more iTunes Ping situations.

They certainly have failures, that's one of them. But nobody was sad when it got killed, you know? Nobody misses iTunes Ping or iAds or MobileMe.

Re: Alphabet Becomes the Most Valuable Public Company in the World

#108

Post by mrb »

newman314 wrote: post #69

People were losing their minds over the fact that iPhone shipments slightly declined. If you look at the year over year growth (excluding the massive bump for iPhone 6), it would show that AAPL is still ahead of the growth curve. See https://imgur.com/vO0kPEy * Apple's quarterly revenue: $75.9bil * Apple's quarterly profit: $18.4bil * Google's quarterly revenue: $21.3bil * Google's quarterly profit: $6.8bil In sheer…

Which pretty much shows that the market value of a company is not based on what they sell today, but on the expectation of what they will sell tomorrow.

Does Apple do research in biotech (Alphabet's Calico)? Are they developing drones delivering wireless internet to the world (Google's Skybender)? Do they have an investment arm (Google Ventures)? Did they start an ISP (Google Fiber)?

People see Alphabet's increasing outreach that almost seems ludicrous. Then they compare this with Apple who seems to have been doing iPhones and iPads for 6-10 years, and doesn't seem to be interested in anything else (though this is slowly changing with Apple apparently getting into home automation and self-driving vehicles). It doesn't matter if it is true or not. This is what people perceive. This is what makes them value Google more than Apple. For all we know smartphones and tablets could be disrupted by another technology (the same way PCs were disrupted by phones and tablets) and Apple may not be ready for this next tech disruption, while Google is placing bets in many other markets.

Re: Alphabet Becomes the Most Valuable Public Company in the World

#109

Post by jfuhrman »

jonknee wrote: post #47
jonesb6 wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I absolutely agree that comparing Google and apple is silly. But calling Google an "artificial intelligence" company is just feeding another buzzword into the fire.

Why? It's obvious that is where they are going.

How much of Google's profit(or even revenue) is not from tracking user data and advertising?

Search, Gmail, Android, Chromebooks, Nexus, Pixel, Youtube, Maps etc. everything is about selling advertisements after scanning user provided data.

The rest are either loss leaders or moats, or ones with unclear monetization scenarios like Fiber. One exception is GCE and GAE, but I don't know how much profit/revenue they're making. I would count Google Apps, but until recently they were scanning even paid Google Apps for Business accounts for ad tracking purposes.

Re: Alphabet Becomes the Most Valuable Public Company in the World

#110

Post by shimon »

jonesb6 wrote: post #42
cryptoz wrote: post #35

The comparisons between Google and Apple aren't as apples-to-apples as everyone in the media seems to think. If we're talking about the future of these companies, and their earning power, they are situating themselves very differently. Apple is really a consumer electronics company, Google is an artificial intelligence company. And investors think more money will be in the future of AI instead of consumer hardware an…

I absolutely agree that comparing Google and apple is silly. But calling Google an "artificial intelligence" company is just feeding another buzzword into the fire.

Google's flagship product is a box that you can type words into, and get relevant texts/references/facts in response. It seems like a textbook example of AI.
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