Alphabet’s stock has a new number attached to it, and it is an aggressive one. 24/7 Wall St. now assigns GOOGL a buy recommendation with 90% model confidence, sets a 12-month target of $453.04, and says the bull case could carry shares to $604.63 by June 2, 2028.
That is why the Google stock price is drawing attention now. The shares were trading at $372.58 when the call was made, after rising 116.29% over the past year and 18.81% year to date. They also sat just 3% below their 52-week high of $404.47, leaving investors to weigh how much further a stock can climb when the market already sees a lot of the optimism.
The case behind the target rests on Alphabet’s AI and cloud push. The company announced an $80 billion equity raise to fund AI infrastructure, with Berkshire Hathaway anchoring the deal through a $10 billion private placement. In April, Alphabet reported first-quarter 2026 revenue of $109.90 billion and earnings per share of $5.11, a result that beat estimates by 94.1%. Google Cloud grew 63% and ended the quarter with a backlog of more than $460 billion, giving the bull case a clear story: demand is there, and the company is trying to build fast enough to meet it.
That same story also explains why the stock is not being treated like a straight line higher. Alphabet is guiding to $175 billion to $185 billion in 2026 capital spending, and its first-quarter free cash flow fell 46.6% year over year to $10.12 billion even as operating margin expanded to 36.1%. The bull case depends on cloud monetization and disciplined spending. The risk is that the spending keeps outrunning the cash it throws off, even before the payoff fully arrives.
Analysts are still leaning in. Oppenheimer has a $445 target and a Moderate Buy rating, while 60 of the 66 analysts covering GOOGL rate it Buy or Strong Buy and none rate it a sell. Prediction markets were less exuberant, putting only a 6.3% chance on the stock reaching $450 by month-end. 24/7 Wall St. also sees a bear case at $361.13 over 12 months, a higher-end 12-month bull case at $524.17, and a longer-run extension to $830.82 by 2031.
What matters next is not the headline target itself, but whether Alphabet turns that AI spending into cash at the pace the market is now pricing in. The company’s next major milestone in this setup is its 2026 capital spending plan, and the unresolved question is whether the cloud backlog, ad business and margin gains can absorb a $175 billion to $185 billion investment cycle without slowing the path toward $604.63.
