At this point, Google seems to be a solid pick for most portfolios.
There was a period last year when – for the first time in years – Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) looked shaky.
The king of search and web advertising appeared to be caught with its pants down as ChatGPT presented a remarkable new vision of how the internet could work.
Now, as 2025 draws to a close, Google is back with a vengeance. It has made significant ground in the AI arms race and benefits from its legacy status as the front page of the internet. It appears that reports of the demise of Google (and the web at large) were greatly exaggerated.
For all those reasons, it’s pretty easy to understand why even ChatGPT decided that Google would be a worthwhile addition to our AI Insights portfolio.
Let’s get the goods on GOOG below.
One note: Google’s parent company is Alphabet, but we’ll be referring to the company as Google in this article.
ChatGPT Stock Pick of the Week: Google
Here’s exactly what ChatGPT had to say when asked for a stock recommendation this week:
A single “best” stock pick does not exist for everyone, but one timely, liquid idea with broad analyst support right now is Alphabet (GOOG), assuming you can tolerate normal large-cap tech volatility and hold for several years.
This is the first time in our series that ChatGPT has referenced the risk involved with tech companies while suggesting a long-term hold. It’s a fair point.
Alphabet (GOOG) at a Glance
| Company | Alphabet Inc. |
| Ticker (Exchange) | GOOG (NASDAQ) |
| Founded | 2015 (as Alphabet; Google founded 1998) |
| Headquarters | Mountain View, California, USA |
| CEO | Sundar Pichai |
| Core business | Technology holding company whose main subsidiary, Google provides search, digital ads, AI, Android, YouTube, cloud, hardware, and other internet services |
| Market cap | $3.8 trillion |
| Employees | ~190,000 (2025) |
| Price to earnings ratio (P/E) | 31 |
Our Take
We’ve devoted a fair amount of virtual ink to Google over the last six months, and it’s been interesting to see the tech behemoth rise like a Phoenix in recent months.
In our most recent article senior news writer Dave Kovaleski noted how Google has been outperforming its fellow Magnificent 7 competitors recently:
Like the other Mag 7 firms, Alphabet is boosting its capex [capital expenditure] spending, but it was not viewed negatively by the market. The firm is now anticipating $91 billion to $93 billion in capex spending in 2025, up from our previous estimate of $85 billion. And Ashkenazi said Alphabet anticipates a significant increase in capex spending in 2026.
In Q3, Alphabet spent $24 billion on capital expenditures investing mostly in technical infrastructure. More specifically, approximately 60% of that investment was in servers while 40% in data center and networking equipment.
Alphabet stock got a slew of price target upgrades, including one from JP Morgan, which boosted it to $340 per share.
Alphabet stock looks good with its backlog, robust investment, and relatively cheap valuation, trading at 26 times earnings.
Google stock has become more expensive since then, but it remains cheaper than its Mag7 rivals in terms of P/E ratio, which gives it a unique position in the market.
What Other Experts Are Saying About Google
You’re not going to hear many analysts saying a bad word about Google right now.
According to TipRanks the company is rated as a Strong Buy with 30 analysts suggesting a buy and seven recommending holding the stock. That’s zero sell ratings for everyone keeping track at home. Even Elon Musk recently suggested Google would perform well in the future.
There are a number of factors putting wind in Google’s sales but it mostly seems to come down to its significant strides in AI. Google seems to be succeeding both on the hardware side of the business (it’s building chips that might rival Nvidia in some categories) and on the software front (chatbot Gemini 3 is getting rave reviews).
If that’s not enough, Google recently escaped anti-trust allegations relatively unscathed, and its AI tech will reportedly be used by Apple in its next iteration of Apple Intelligence.
One of the strongest indicators in favor of Google? Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway recently purchased 17.8 million shares of Alphabet.
So what, if anything, can slow the tech titan down?
Honestly, it’s hard to find anyone speaking an ill word of Alphabet right now. However, falling behind in AI remains a clear and present danger to the company. Conversely, an AI bubble would also impact the company. The only other point of concern might be that it’s already highly valued at roughly $4 trillion, so it’s questionable how much price appreciation is left, at least in the short term.
How Did Last Week’s Pick Perform?
There’s absolutely nothing wrong with CMC’s performance over the last week. Chart from TradingView.com.
Construction material giant Commercial Metal Company (CMC) was certainly a different choice for the AI Insights portfolio, but the early returns are good.
CMC is up over 3% since it was added to the portfolio last week and is suddenly one of the biggest winners in the portfolio. Part of the reason for the price movement appears to be the acquisition of Concrete Pipe & Precast.
Regardless of its early performance, it was probably worth adding CMC in an effort to diversify. The portfolio was starting to learn heavily towards tech and AI.
As for the overall portfolio, the past week wasn’t exactly kind. Four of the seven companies added to the book are in the red. Healthcare company Progyny had a particularly rough week giving back much of its early gains. Interestingly, storage titan Seagate Technology is doing the worst of any stock added to the portfolio. It’s down -6.20% since being added to the portfolio, which is surprising considering it’s somewhat of an AI darling.
At this point the AI Insights portfolio might as well be called the Micron Technology portfolio as that one stock is dragging the entire experiment toward profitability. Micron is up a staggering 22% since it was added to the portfolio last month.
Here’s an updated look at the AI Insights portfolio after seven weeks:
AI Insights Portfolio Week #7
- Total invested: $700
- Current Market Value: $711.49
- Total Unrealized Gains: 1.64%
| Stock | Shares | Day Gain | Total Gains | Market Value |
| Commercial Metal Company (CMC) | 1.56 | 3.62 | 3.10% | $103.07 |
| Nvidia (NVDA) | 0.536 | -1.60% | -3.72% | $96.26 |
| Progyny (PGNY | 4.15 | -1.66% | 1.99% | $101.88 |
| Seagate (STX) | 0.363 | -3.07% | -6.20% | $93.90 |
| Comcast (CMCSA) | 3.5 | 1.52% | -3.86% | $96.01 |
| NetApp (NTAP) | 0.86 | -1.01% | -1.80 | $98.61 |
| Micron Technology (MU) | .52 | -2.23% | 22.00% | $121.76 |
We’ve put in plenty of work getting ChatGPT to give us some quality stock picks but, at this point at least, it hasn’t really been worth the effort.
Just buying 100% VTI (a popular overall index fund), which we’ve been doing in our control portfolio, would provide essentially the same performance (and arguably less risk).
Technically, the AI Insights portfolio is still performing 0.12% better but that’s negligible. We’re off next week so it will be interesting to see how everything looks in two weeks’ time.
Standard Portfolio (100% VTI) Week #7
- Total invested: $700
- Current Market Value: $711.15
- Total Unrealized Gains: +1.52%
| Stock | Shares | Day Gain | Total Gains | Market Value |
| Vanguard Total Stock Index (VTI) | 2.113 | 0.45% | 1.52% | $711.15 |
Methodology
Every week, we ask ChatGPT for a simple stock recommendation after the market closes on Wednesday. Then we invest $100 into the stock and $100 into a control portfolio of 100% VTI.
You can read more about the parameters for the experiment at the bottom of the first AI Insights article.
Disclaimer: Neither the large language models or ValueWalk suggest actually using this as an investment strategy. This article is for educational purposes only.
