If You Invested $1000 in Alphabet a Decade Ago, This is How Much It'd Be Worth Now
Another factor that can influence investors is FOMO, or the fear of missing out, especially with tech giants and popular consumer-facing stocks.
What if you'd invested in Alphabet (GOOGL) ten years ago? It may not have been easy to hold on to GOOGL for all that time, but if you did, how much would your investment be worth today?
Alphabet's Business In-Depth
With that in mind, let's take a look at Alphabet's main business drivers.
Alphabet is one of the most innovative companies in the modern technological age. Over the last few years, the company has evolved from primarily being a search-engine provider to cloud computing, ad-based video and music streaming, autonomous vehicles, healthcare providers and others. In the online search arena, Google has a monopoly with more than 94% of the online search volume and market.The company is gaining market share in the cloud-computing, driven by continued strength in Google Cloud Platform and Google Workspace.Alphabet also enjoys a dominant position in the autonomous vehicles market, thanks to Waymo's relentless efforts. In addition, it has bolstered its footprint in the healthcare industry with its life science division, Verily. The company has also become a renowned name in the world of entertainment on the back of YouTube.Alphabet is also known as the maker of smartwatches (Pixel Watch), laptops and tablets (Chromebooks), and smart home products (Google Nest).Alphabet, headquartered in Mountain View, CA, runs several businesses, most of which come under Google, which reports under two segments — Google Services and Google Cloud. The non-Google businesses fall under the Other Bets segment.Total revenues were $350 billion in 2024, up 14% over 2023. Google Services, Google Cloud and Other Bets generated 87.1%, 12.4% and 0.5% of total revenues, respectively.The Google Services includes products and services such as ads, Android, Chrome, devices, Gmail, Google Drive, Google Maps, Google Photos, Google Play, Search, and YouTube. The segment generates revenues primarily from performance and brand advertising, which remains crucial for the overall business. Ad revenues accounted for 75.6% of the total revenues in 2024.Google Cloud is comprised of Google Cloud Platform and Google Workspace. Its key capabilities include AI infrastructure, database and analytics, collaboration tools, cybersecurity and generative AI.Other Bets is a combination of multiple businesses, generating revenues primarily from the sale of healthcare-related and internet services.
Bottom Line
Putting together a successful investment portfolio takes a combination of research, patience, and a little bit of risk. For Alphabet, if you bought shares a decade ago, you're likely feeling really good about your investment today.
A $1000 investment made in July 2015 would be worth $5,247.99, or a gain of 424.80%, as of July 18, 2025, according to our calculations. This return excludes dividends but includes price appreciation.
Compare this to the S&P 500's rally of 196.12% and gold's return of 183.10% over the same time frame.
Analysts are anticipating more upside for GOOGL.
Alphabet is riding on strong cloud and search growth. Google Cloud is benefiting from accelerated growth across AI infrastructure, enterprise AI platform Vertex and strong adoption of Generative AI solutions. The company expects capital expenditures in 2025 to be relatively higher than in 2024, aimed at building technical infrastructure, primarily for servers, followed by data centers and networking. Its dominant position in the search engine market is a strong growth driver. In first-quarter 2025, GOOGL saw continued double-digit revenue growth in Search. Alphabet surpassed 270 million paid subscriptions with YouTube and Google One as key drivers. However, increasing litigation issues are a concern. Intensifying competition from Microsoft and Amazon in cloud computing is a headwind. Shares have underperformed its industry year to date.
Shares have gained 5.92% over the past four weeks and there have been 4 higher earnings estimate revisions for fiscal 2025 compared to none lower. The consensus estimate has moved up as well.
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