By Adam Clark

Alphabet stock was wavering early Friday as investors focus on legal risks in Europe, as well as concern that artificial intelligence is hurting its U.S. search business.

Google is being sued for EUR2.97 billion ($3.34 billion) in damages by the Italian company Moltiply Group, according to a statement on Friday. Moltiply alleges that Google abused its position as the dominant search engine to favor Google Shopping in the period between 2010 and 2017. Moltiply owns the Italian price-comparison website Trovaprezzi.it.

Google was hit with a hefty fine by European Union officials in 2017, when the bloc's executive arm said the company abused its market dominance as a search engine by promoting its own comparison-shopping service in search results and demoting those of competitors. Google lost an appeal against the EUR2.42 billion penalty last year.

A number of private claims against Google have either been resumed or launched following the EU's final decision. The German price-comparison site Idealo said in February it was demanding at least EUR3.3 billion in damages from Google. U.K.-based companies Kelkoo and Foundem are also suing Google.

"The changes Google made in 2017 following the European Commission's decision are working as intended and the number of comparison shopping sites in Europe using our shopping features has multiplied from just 7 to more than 1,550," a Google spokesperson said in a statement. "We disagree strongly with these exorbitant private damages claims which disregard this successful and growing industry."

Alphabet shares were down 0.1% in early trading.

While those cases are a headache, the main issue for the stock is still the threat from AI. Alphabet shares dropped sharply earlier this week after an Apple executive testified in a Department of Justice lawsuit against Google that searches in the iPhone maker's browsers fell for the first time in April.

However, Google subsequently said that the number of search queries was still growing. As Barron's has written, the search company is also likely to find new ways of generating revenue from AI, both in its core search business and beyond.

Write to Adam Clark at adam.clark@barrons.com

This content was created by Barron's, which is operated by Dow Jones & Co. Barron's is published independently from Dow Jones Newswires and The Wall Street Journal.

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May 09, 2025 09:52 ET (13:52 GMT)

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