Google is in the government’s crosshairs after the Justice Department and 11 states filed an antitrust suit against the Alphabet subsidiary.
The lawsuit focuses on Google’s alleged monopoly over the online search industry. Google holds a more than 87% share of the U.S. search market, according to Statcounter.
The efforts to break up the search giant are reminiscent of lawsuits against Microsoft in the late 1990s.
“As an investor, as an owner of the stock, this wasn’t a blindside hit,” said Mark Tepper, president of Strategic Wealth Partners. “This has been a headline risk for years, and it really doesn’t change my outlook.”
Tepper said Google undoubtedly has a monopoly over the search market. However, he questioned how effective any efforts to break up the company would be.
“There’s really no way to know for sure how this exactly plays out,” he told CNBC’s “Trading Nation” on Tuesday. “Probably some more regulation, probably a fine, but what’s the government going to do? Are they going to take business from Google and then give it to an even larger giant like Microsoft?”
The DOJ alleges that Google has leveraged its monopoly to stifle competition through its search channels. Google countered that people use their platform by choice, not force.
“I need to own this stock,” added Tepper. “There’s a theme I need to play for clients. That theme is that sales people aren’t knocking door to door anymore, so more sales are being done online through pay-per-click platforms like Google and Facebook. And just because of the lawsuit, that does not negate the theme that I’m trying to play.”
Matt Maley, chief market strategist at Miller Tabak, is mapping key levels for Google parent Alphabet.
“On a short-term basis, you have to look at the 50-day moving average. That’s at $1,530, it bounced off that [Tuesday], so that’s bullish and the whole thing over the next week or two is going to be whether it holds or breaks below that level,” Maley said during the same “Trading Nation” segment.
“On a longer-term basis, it’s going to be the recent highs and lows. Way up at $1,717, that’s the old highs. If it breaks above that, it’s obviously going to be very bullish. And then if we go down, however, if we roll back over … and we break below the lows we saw over the summer, that’ll give it a key lower low and tell us that on a macro picture some tougher times are coming for us,” Maley said.
Alphabet closed Tuesday just above $1,551 a share.
Disclosure: Strategic Wealth Partners holds GOOGL.
