Would you buy a 100-year bond? Google just issued one.
Would you buy a 100-year bond? Google just issued one.
Daniel de Visé, USA TODAYFri, February 27, 2026 at 8:01 AM UTC
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Alphabet, parent company of Google, made news in February when it issued a 100-year bond.
Yes, a bond with a repayment date a century from now.
It’s hard to imagine many investors would line up to buy century bonds, given that most of us won’t live long enough to see our investment repaid.
"You and I will not be around when these bonds expire," said Jason Moser, senior investment analyst at The Motley Fool.
Yet, with its 100-year bond issue, Alphabet telegraphed to the investment community that it expects to be around in 2126. And so did the institutional investors, pension funds and hedge funds that bought them.
The tech giant drew bids worth nearly 10 times the bonds' value, totaling roughly $1.4 billion in U.S. dollars, according to Bloomberg. The 100-year bond was part of a larger offering that raised nearly $32 billion in a 24-hour span.
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Armchair American investors couldn't buy Google's century bonds even if they wanted to. They were issued in Britain, in minimum denominations of 100,000 British pounds, with a prospectus that barred their sale to retail investors.
Alphabet is borrowing money despite annual revenues that top $400 billion as it ramps up a massive AI spending spree. In February, the company announced that it plans AI capital investments of $175 billion or more in 2026.
Alphabet, parent company of Google, made headlines in February by selling a 100-year bond.Here's why Alphabet is selling a 100-year bond
A billion-dollar bond issue is pocket change for Alphabet, a company with a market capitalization of $3.8 trillion. But analysts say the century bond holds symbolic value.
"I think Google is saying, 'We’re issuing a 100-year bond because we can,' And not every company can do that," said Lawrence Gillum, chief fixed income strategist for LPL Financial.
A century bond speaks to Alphabet’s corporate confidence in the fast-changing tech industry, which has watched the decline of many heavyweights, from Xerox to BlackBerry to Motorola.
"They’re making a statement and saying, 'Hey, listen, we’re still going to be around here in 100 years,'" Moser said. "As a Google shareholder myself, I feel like it’s a confidence-booster."
Having the bravado to issue a 100-year bond does not, of course, guarantee you will be around in 100 years.
Century bonds are rare in corporate America, rarer still in tech. The last 100-year bond in the tech industry came from Motorola in 1997, Reuters reports. A cellphone and pager pioneer, Motorola faded with the rise of the smartphone.
Motorola is still in business and still paying interest to its 100-year bondholders. But its decline provides a cautionary tale.
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IBM issued a 100-year bond in 1996. In the years that followed, the computer giant lost market share and eventually exited the PC business.
Those century bondholders have fared better than others.
Since 1990, U.S. public companies have issued at least 38 century bonds. "Only 17 of those companies are still around," said Caleb Silver, editor in chief of Investopedia.
You aren't likely to be alive when Alphabet's new 100-year bond matures. Yet, the tech giant found buyers.Why would anyone buy a 100-year bond?
Why would an insurance company or pension fund buy a 100-year bond? Why would anyone?
One reason is that century bonds tend to pay an unusually high yield. Alphabet’s 100-year bond offers an interest rate of 6.125%, Reuters reports. That compares favorably to current yields on 10-, 20- and 30-year U.S. Treasury bonds, which range between 4% and 5%.
"Even in the last 40 years, you’ve had many companies issue 100-year bonds, and investors want them because they pay a very high yield," Silver said.
Hedge funds and pension funds buy 100-year bonds to provide a long and stable source of income to balance long-term debts that are already on their books.
"There is an appetite for it," Silver said. "It sounds unusual. It actually is not that unusual."
If Alphabet still exists as a company in 2126, great. But century bondholders aren’t necessarily counting on that.
"If you are a pension fund or an insurance company, you can be pretty confident Alphabet is going to be around 10 years from now, and that’s good enough," said John Canavan, lead analyst at Oxford Economics.
Should bondholders ever grow concerned for Alphabet’s future, they could probably find a buyer on the secondary market, analysts said, albeit at a discount.
"Someone else will still buy them," Canavan said. "You’re not going to walk away with nothing."
In the worst-case scenario, if Alphabet were to go bust, 100-year bondholders would recoup at least some of their money in bankruptcy court, Gillum said.
"There is some sort of protection," he said, "but odds are you won’t be getting 100 cents on the dollar."
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Google issued a 100-year bond. Here's how the market reacted.
Source: “AOL Money”
