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Promotional graphic for Google's Gemini 4 Argon AI model
Photo: Google / The Decoder

Alphabet Stock Falls 2% After Gemini 4 Argon Launch

Yahoo Finance (via Investing.com)2 min read6 sources

Why did Alphabet stock fall 2% after Gemini 4 Argon?

Alphabet (GOOGL) stock fell about 2% to $338.85 on Thursday after Google launched its Gemini 4 Argon model, as early gains faded amid doubts over its real-world coding skill.

Key numbers

Alphabet intraday move, Oct 1$338.85-2% after +2% premarket
Alphabet close, Oct 1$338.24-1.7% (per [6])
DeepSWE v1.1 coding score77.9%vs 74.2% Claude Opus 5.5
Terminal-Bench 4.0 score57.4%vs 66.4% Claude Opus 5.5
Intro price per million tokens$2 in / $10 outrises to $4 / $20 later

What happened

Alphabet (GOOGL) stock fell about 2% to $338.85 on Thursday after Google launched its Gemini 4 Argon model, as early gains faded amid doubts over its real-world coding skill. Argon costs $2 per million input tokens (small chunks of text) and $10 per million output, with prices set to double later. In Google's own tests it beat Anthropic's Claude Opus 5.5 on a key coding test, 77.9% to 74.2%. Opus still leads on a harder test, and Bloomberg reported some Google staff find Argon weaker in real work.

Why it matters

Alphabet (GOOGL) stock showed how quickly investors test new AI models: a 2% morning gain faded within hours as doubts about real-world coding skill surfaced. Argon is open for now only to cybersecurity specialists, so it is not yet earning money for Google. Its low price could pressure rivals such as OpenAI and Anthropic if it performs as promised.

Who this affects

Marketmixed
Low impact
AI-focused investors face mixed signals on Google's new model.
Companymixed
Medium impact
Alphabet shareholders saw early gains erased; revenue case still unproven.
Competitorsmixed
Medium impact
OpenAI and Anthropic face cheaper rival but keep some leads.
Industryneutral
Medium impact
AI buyers get lower prices, but real-world quality remains unproven.

Alphabet vs Microsoft, Amazon, Meta Platforms

AlphabetGOOGL$4.20T-1.7%25.6x
MicrosoftMSFT$3.84T0.0%26.2x
AmazonAMZN$2.71T-0.4%26.8x
Meta PlatformsMETA$1.85T—22.6x

As of 2026-10-02

How we got here

  1. Google announces Gemini 4 Argon; Bloomberg reports employee doubts about its coding performance.

  2. Alphabet gains about 2% premarket, then slips 2% to $338.85 intraday.

  3. Alphabet closes at $338.24, down 1.7% on the day.

  4. Alphabet rebounds 1.56% to close at $343.50.

What to watch

  • Wider Argon release to paying developers and Google AI Ultra subscribers; Google gave no date.Date not announced
  • Introductory pricing ends, rising to $4 input and $20 output per million tokens.Date not announced

Educational content only. Not investment advice.

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