Last friday, the Google stock was down at a real low. At 406 dollars a share it hit its lowest level in a year. Then yesterday, it broke the downward-spiraling trend that had been haunting the company since summer, when the expected recession clouded the stock market, as the stock raced to a new peak at a close 450 dollars.

What can upset a gloomy, recession-anticipating, financial market? The same thing that brought the Google stock to its last, monumental peak at 747 dollars a share in early November last year:

The Google android smartphone, G1.

On November 5, last year, Google finally confirmed rumours that they will produce an android smartphone (in case you missed it, although more than 3 million google hits suggest you haven’t, it basically means that the phone is programmable for the user). Expectations of that announcement had pushed the Google stock toward the sky for the last month or so, and when the announcement was made, the market went into an almost week-long expectations frenzy leading up to the record peak. 

Yesterday, at 10:30 am local time, Google (together with T-Mobile) unveiled the G1 in New York, announcing that it will be released on October 27 in the US, at 179 dollars a piece. The phone will then be released in the UK in November and in the rest of Europe thereafter.

As I write this, less than 24 hours later, there are already 142 youtube clips of the G1, including this one from the launch event: