Google shares drop to 11-month low

SAN FRANCISCO – The U.S. economy is wheezing so badly that even Internet power Google Inc. and its once-robust stock is looking haggard.

The focus on Google’s recent deterioration sharpened Tuesday as investors reacted to the latest evidence indicating fewer people in the United States are clicking on the Internet ads that generate most of the online search leader’s profits.

The trend, captured in a closely followed report from Internet research firm comScore Inc., shoved Google shares to an 11-month low. The drop extended a slump that has lowered the Mountain View-based company’s market value by 33 percent, or about $70 billion, during the first seven weeks of the year. The tech-laden Nasdaq composite index has declined by 12 percent during the same stretch.

The sell-off represents a sobering shift in Wall Street’s sentiment toward Google, whose dominance of the lucrative Internet search market had convinced many investors that the company would thrive even in a recession.

The ebullience helped propel Google shares to a peak of $747.24 in early November and kept it just below $700 as the new year began. The stock price closed Tuesday at $464.19, down $22.25. The shares sank as low as $446.85 earlier in the session, a level that hadn’t been reached since last March.