IT·Science News

Google loses $500bn in value: is its AI search eating its own ads?

Google's parent company lost about $500bn in market value after its latest results, sending its shares to a six-month low, BBC News reports. The BBC puts the cause in one line: Google revealed that its own AI-generated search summaries were affecting advertising revenue.

The Japan Times, running a Bloomberg report, goes to the numbers. Third-quarter sales excluding partner payouts were $111.2bn, short of analysts' forecasts, and ad sales from search and other channels, roughly half of revenue and the money behind its AI spending, grew at the slowest pace in five quarters.

The results “show us the margin for error when a hyperscaler spending hundreds of billions on the AI infrastructure buildout” posts disappointing results in its core business. — JPMorgan analysts, via The Japan Times

How each outlet framed it

• BBC News — the paradox: Google's own AI answers taking clicks away from its ads.
• The Japan Times — the investor view: missed forecasts, and doubts about paying for enormous AI spending.

Not yet known: neither report says how much of the slowdown comes from AI summaries rather than other causes.