** Google-parent Alphabet shares jump 11% to $173.40 premarket
** If gains hold, GOOGL set to top $2 trln market cap
** Announces first-ever dividend of 20 cents/shr, $70-bln stock buyback
** Posts Q1 sales, profit and advertising above estimates
** Co, Microsoft show investors heavy AI investment can pay off with rising revenue, allaying concerns sparked by Meta's signals on Thu that costly AI bet could take years to fructify
** "Google has faced near-constant critique around the inevitable AI-led disruption to search... Google needed to be perfect, or face a repeat of being penalized for micro-misses. It was perfect. Breathe," - Bernstein
** Megacap peers Amazon.com , Nvidia , Meta and Tesla up 1%-3%, Microsoft up 3.8% after Q3 results beat
** Out of 53 brokerages tracking GOOGL, 14 rate "strong buy", 29 "buy" and 10 "hold"; median PT $175
** As of last close, GOOGL shares up ~12% YTD vs 5.8% and 4% gain in S&P 500 and Nasdaq , respectively
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(Reporting by Ankika Biswas in Bengaluru)
((Ankika.Biswas@thomsonreuters.com))
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