Google the Smart Bet — The Bobby Axelrod Options Playbook

Sell puts. Collect premium. Don’t chase the tape — structure the trade like Bobby Axelrod. Let Google come to you.

May 08, 2025 / By The Coastal Journal

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“The track gave me my first real look at how the world worked. I watched people running toward the betting window, high hopes, no plan. I didn’t want to be one of those guys walking away from the track, ripping up their tickets in disgust…

The guys who had a plan, guys who were grinding, guys who took the guess work out of it, they knew which riders were rested, which horses were ready & which horses were on their last leg, So I started watching instead of betting. The numbers told the story. They always do.”

— Bobby Axelrod, Billions

This scene in Billions where Bobby Axelrod breaks down the racetrack hustle: the amateurs chase action, the pros chase information. It’s not about gut feelings. It’s about grinding out the edge, late and heavy, once you understand the game.

Today, Google — is the horse. And the numbers? They’re whispering something the crowd isn’t hearing yet. But recent research from Golden Coast Consultants is watching.

As we warned at the start of the year about the overvaluation in stocks, the trade risk like in this previous report (Leave the Bubble, Take the Gold ) , and a hawkish Fed ( HERE ), Alphabet has quietly emerged as the rarest of breeds: a high-growth tech titan trading at deep-value multiples due to its recent pull back in value.

The Numbers Don’t Lie: Google’s PE Is Just 16

At a time when the NASDAQ is trading at a bubble level territory 35x earnings, and tech peers like Microsoft (34x), Apple (31x), and Amazon (31x) continue to defy gravity in valuations, Google sits alone with a price-to-earnings ratio of just 16. That’s not just a discount — it’s mis-pricing.

Golden Coast Market Strategist Greg Crennan put it bluntly: “If you can own one of the world’s most cash-rich, margin-stable, innovation-leading tech company at a PE lower than a mid-cap REIT, you add it to the wish list. Or better yet — you sell puts and wait for the amateurs to rip up their tickets.”

Google is still printing over $200 billion annually from its advertising machine, with gross margins stable around 56%. Free cash flow is healthy.

Net income? Up 69% from 2022 to a TTM of $84 billion. This isn’t a fading Web 2.0 relic. This is a data empire with future highways already paved.

Waymo: The Hidden Gem Worth Betting On

Google’s optionality is where the real edge lies — particularly in Waymo, the crown jewel of autonomous driving. While revenue today is low in comparison to Google’s other businesses, the infrastructure is real. Waymo is already operating fully driverless RoboTaxis in Phoenix, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Austin, with more to come at the end of 2025 and the start of 2026.

In Uber’s latest earnings call, the CEO flatly admitted: “Waymo is the leader in autonomous driving.” That wasn’t fluff — it was strategic alignment. Uber now integrates Waymo directly into its app, offering autonomous rides in four cities.

But the real kicker? Google’s partnership with Toyota. The two plan to integrate Waymo’s self-driving tech into mass-market Toyota vehicles — potentially including the Prius and other high-volume EV/hybrid platforms. Waymo’s current unit economics are steep (about $180,000 per vehicle), but with Toyota’s global manufacturing scale, those costs could plummet. That’s how moonshots become margins.

What’s the Google Strategy Today — Selling Puts

With the S&P teetering on geopolitical risk & earnings deceleration, Golden Coast Consultants isn’t blindly buying shares at $150+. Instead, they’re employing a classic Bobby Axelrod move: they’re betting late, betting heavy — and betting with a plan.