Alphabet (GOOGL) stock climbed roughly 1% on Wednesday after a federal judge rejected the Department of Justice’s push to force Google to sell its advertising exchange, AdX.
Judge Leonie Brinkema issued her ruling under seal, with a brief order denying the DOJ’s demand. A redacted version is expected to be released at a later date.
Rather than ordering a sale, Brinkema told Google to make behavioral changes to how it operates its ad business. The specifics of those changes have not been made public yet.
The ruling stems from an April 2025 finding that Google illegally monopolized two advertising technology markets. The DOJ had asked the court to force a sale of AdX and require Google to make its ad auction logic publicly available.
The DOJ’s goal was to break up part of Google’s ad tech stack. AdX is the exchange that publishers use to sell ad space in real-time auctions that happen the moment a user loads a webpage.
Google charges publishers a 20% fee to use the platform. While that sounds like a big number, AdX represents a small slice of Alphabet’s overall revenue.
The judge’s decision means Google keeps AdX intact and avoids being forced into a public auction of one of its core ad infrastructure tools.
This is now the second time Alphabet has beaten back a DOJ effort to force it to sell off assets. The first attempt centered on Google’s dominant position in online search, and that case also did not result in a breakup.
GOOGL stock has gained 45% over the past 12 months heading into this ruling.
Wall Street remains bullish. Among 30 analysts covering the stock, the consensus is a Strong Buy, built on 25 Buy ratings and five Hold recommendations issued in the last three months.
The average price target sits at $422.59, which implies about 23% upside from current levels.
The stock was trading up approximately 1.01% on Wednesday following the ruling.
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