Billionaire investor Bill Ackman said Pershing Square’s sale of Alphabet (GOOGL) shares was not a bet against the Google parent.
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Ackman said on X that Pershing still likes Alphabet for the long term. “To be clear, our sale of Google was not a bet against the company. We are very bullish long-term on Alphabet,” he wrote.
Instead, the move looks like a simple shift in capital. Pershing sold Alphabet shares to help fund a new stake in Microsoft Corporation (MSFT).
Microsoft Looked Better at the Margin
Ackman said Pershing used Alphabet “as a source of funds for Microsoft,” meaning a sale by a major fund does not always mean the fund sees risk ahead. In this case, Ackman is saying Microsoft looked like the better use of capital after its recent stock drop.
As a result, the move seems less like a warning on Alphabet and more like a choice between two top tech names. Alphabet still has strong assets in search, ads, cloud, and AI. However, Microsoft may have looked more appealing to Ackman based on price, timing, and its role in the AI and cloud market.
For investors, the key point to remember is that Ackman is not calling Alphabet a bad business. Rather, he is showing a stronger near-term tilt toward Microsoft. That makes the move a relative-value call, not a red flag on Google’s parent company.
We used TipRanks’ Comparison Tool to compare Alphabet and Microsoft for an in-depth view of each stock and the broader AI industry.
