Evercore ISI analyst Mark Mahaney projects that OpenAI’s planned advertising rollout on ChatGPT’s free and low-cost tiers could generate up to $25 billion in annual revenue by 2030—more than doubling OpenAI’s roughly $20 billion in 2025 revenue and directly challenging Google’s core search advertising franchise. ChatGPT reported 900 million weekly users as of December 2025, making it arguably the fastest-growing consumer app ever. If advertisers shift even a fraction of their search budgets to ChatGPT, Google’s search query volume and ad click rates could come under pressure, forcing the company to defend its dominant advertising market share and potentially adjust pricing or product features to retain advertisers.

Analysts forecast Alphabet’s revenue to grow around 14 percent year-over-year in 2025, driven by a 34 percent increase in Google Cloud and mid-teens growth in search and YouTube advertising, with operating margins near 31 percent. Meta Platforms is expected to deliver roughly 21 percent revenue growth in the same period, fueled by a 14 percent rise in ad impressions and a 10 percent increase in average ad price, and an operating margin near 40 percent. Alphabet trades at a forward price-to-earnings multiple near 29.5, while Meta’s multiple is nearer 20.8, leading many investors to consider a split allocation to capture Alphabet’s cloud diversification and Meta’s faster ad growth at a cheaper valuation.

In California, U.S. District Judge Rita F. Lin refused to dismiss core federal and California unfair-competition claims alleging that Google unlawfully maintained monopoly power in general search services through exclusive default-search agreements with device makers and browser developers. The plaintiffs allege that these contracts—such as preset defaults on Apple devices, Android handsets, Safari and Firefox browsers—foreclosed rivals’ access to search traffic, advertising demand and valuable user data. The court found the plaintiffs adequately pled antitrust injury and that damages need not be dismissed for complexity at this early stage. Claims tied to conduct since Google’s 2017 agreement with Mozilla survive, while some timing-related allegations were trimmed with leave to amend.

Pershing Square Capital Management increased its exposure to Alphabet shares beginning in early 2023, accumulating roughly 6.3 million Class C and 4.8 million Class A shares by the end of Q3 2025. Since then, share price gains have propelled paper profits of approximately $551 million on the Class C position and $1.48 billion on the Class A position, totaling over $2 billion in unrealized gains. Ackman trimmed about 10 percent of the Class A holding in Q3 but remains heavily invested, underscoring his conviction in Alphabet’s continued revenue growth and AI-driven expansion despite selling a modest slice before the shares’ subsequent rise.