GOOG Reddit Mentions | ChartExchange

What's not priced in is the FCF if their Capex returns to about half of EBITDA; it's about 80% right now which is high for a mature company. If that happens earnings goes up by about 2.5X and the P/E (garbage metric but retail follows it) goes to 12.
What I find difficult here to game out is that the only way this happens is if data center investment goes down which would likely only happen if proved un or less profitable which would increase the depreciation which would then hurt GAP earnings and maybe investor confidence in leadership. This company has (had?) a chance to be an incredible cash cow and very attractive if/when they prioritize returning value to share holders but that doesn't appear to be the current plan.
Meta appeared to double revenue at least in part to relaxing who they allow to advertise which could hurt their brand long term. That said, it doesn't appear that many people will leave despite the increase in paid advertised scams and the government has historically been very hands off with "free" products/ad revenue driven products. Meta can only really drop Capex enough to increase earnings about 35%-40% based on historical data, but frankly I think they have historically allocated capital poorly and could drive that number up significantly with more discipline but ultimately is a less optimal position IMO given each leadership teams track record in both a winner take all and a move to cash cow path.
Both are venturing more and more into low margin physical asset investments which I believe will ultimately weigh on them. Both would be better off picking up undervalued asset light opportunities. I am heavily invested in Yelp so may be biased here, but I think that now that Yelp expanded heavily into 1) services and 2) AI as a service it would be a great bolt on for either company right now given their substantial cashflow yield. I also think if the market does experience a major pullback, a fintech play would the type of investment either could see substantial long term profit from given the built in network effect they would bring resulting in substantial cashflow.
Meta has burned substantial money trying to get VR to work and AI may be the same for them but makes more sense with AMZN but I don't think is optimal for either (or the market at large) given the energy constraints of current tech, but understand why these two along with MSFT and GOOG have to be investing so they don't end up too far behind if the cards play out in a way where it does become highly profitable in its current or close to its current state.