Alphabet (GOOG) (GOOGL) released its Q2 2026 earnings yesterday, July 22, after the close of markets, with a mixed bag of beating on the top line and missing on the bottom line. Revenues increased 24% year-over-year to $119.8 billion, ahead of the $116.9 billion analysts expected. Google Search revenues rose 17% YoY, YouTube ad revenues rose 13%, and cloud revenues grew 82%, beating estimates of 63% growth. The cloud order backlog rose by over $50 billion as compared to Q1 and surpassed $500 billion. However, the company expects near-term margin pressure from using third-party compute capacity and raised its 2026 capex budget to between $195 billion and $205 billion, $15 billion higher than previous guidance. The stock is down today as investors fret over the ever-growing capex to build AI infrastructure. CEO Sundar Pichai termed Gemini 4 as “ambitious” thrice during the Q2 earnings call, and the overall tone suggested the 2027 budget might only be higher than this year.