Alphabet (GOOG) shares dropped 5% to settle at $349.68 on Monday, recording their steepest single-day fall since May 2025. The sharp decline stems from two main pressures: the loss of world-class artificial intelligence (AI) talent and a significant decrease in the value of its investment in SpaceX (SPCX), in which GOOGL holds about a 5% stake.
A major source of investor anxiety revolves around the ongoing exodus of AI specialists. Recently, John Jumper, Vice President of Google DeepMind and Nobel Chemistry laureate for 2024 for his AI breakthroughs, resigned to join rival company Anthropic. Previously, Noam Shazeer, a key AI researcher instrumental in foundational work for Generative AI, also left to work with OpenAI. These departures have severely shaken investor confidence in GOOGL’s ability to maintain its leadership in AI technology over the long term.
At the same time, GOOGL has suffered from SPCX shares plummeting 16.5% in a single day, the sharpest decline since entering the market on June 12, while marking the third-day straight of decline. The slump came amid market concerns about excessive stock valuations, compounded by reports that SpaceX plans an additional funding round through bond issuance to support massive investments in its Starship spacecraft project and AI infrastructure.
With these negative factors—including the departure of AI talent to direct competitors and the declining value of the SPCX investment—GOOGL has become one of the biggest drags on the Nasdaq Index in the latest round of trading.
