Alphabet's $99B "profit" is mostly on-paper gains — its real business earned $40.8B
Alphabet's Q2 net income hit a record $112.1B, but $99B of it came from unrealized gains on early stakes in SpaceX and other companies — not from selling anything. Its actual business profit, operating income, was $40.8B, up 30%. The mark-to-market balloon flatters the 16x P/E, hiding a far less dramatic story underneath.