What happened Shares of Alphabet (NASDAQ: GOOG) (NASDAQ: GOOGL) were sliding last month, falling in line with the broader market on worries about the expanding coronavirus outbreak. There was no major news about the search giant during the month, but the strength of Alphabet's advertising business is highly correlated with the overall economy. With the massive economic shock caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, investors assumed Alphabet was losing business. Image source: Alphabet. According to data from S&P Global Market Intelligence, the stock fell 13% in March. As you can see from the chart below, Alphabet's movements tracked closely with the S&P 500. ^SPX data by YCharts. So what Google was one of the first major companies to tell workers to stay home, making the announcement on March 10, a sign of the challenges ahead. Though the company has not offered any significant insight into its business performance during the COVID-19 outbreak, rival Facebook (NASDAQ: FB) provided some useful color. The social-networking giant said that traffic had surged on its sites but it saw a "weakening in our ads business in countries taking aggressive actions to reduce the spread of COVID-19." The same is likely true for Alphabet, as the two companies rely on many of the same advertisers to drive business. With consumers largely stuck at home, avoiding most discretionary purchases, there's no reason for such businesses to advertise. Alphabet, however, does have a silver lining. Demand for Google Cloud services have ramped up, especially its video-conferencing product, Google Meet, which has seen usage jump 25 times from where it was in January. It's also rolled out Google Classroom to 1.3 million students in New York City to help facilitate remote learning. Now what Though Alphabet is clearly vulnerable to the pullback in advertising, it shouldn't suffer any long-term impact. It's one of the biggest companies in the world, has a fortress-like balance sheet with $120 billion in cash and marketable securities, and essentially holds a monopoly in online search. The company could even emerge from the crisis in a stronger position, as it could make some acquisitions on the cheap and gain market share in some of its key growth areas. A further pullback in the stock could present a buying opportunity. 10 stocks we like better than Alphabet (A shares)When investing geniuses David and Tom Gardner have a stock tip, it can pay to listen. After all, the newsletter they have run for over a decade, Motley Fool Stock Advisor, has tripled the market.* David and Tom just revealed what they believe are the ten best stocks for investors to buy right now... and Alphabet (A shares) wasn't one of them! That's right -- they think these 10 stocks are even better buys. See the 10 stocks *Stock Advisor returns as of March 18, 2020 Suzanne Frey, an executive at Alphabet, is a member of The Motley Fool's board of directors. Randi Zuckerberg, a former director of market development and spokeswoman for Facebook and sister to its CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, is a member of The Motley Fool's board of directors. Jeremy Bowman owns shares of Facebook. The Motley Fool owns shares of and recommends Alphabet (A shares), Alphabet (C shares), and Facebook. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.Source