Feb 5 (Reuters) - Amazon.com (AMZN.O) on Thursday joined its Big Tech peers in projecting massive capital expenditures in 2026, the freshest sign yet that tech companies will not be hitting the brakes on their hefty AI investments anytime soon.
The company said it expects to invest about $200 billion in capital expenditures across Amazon in 2026, compared with an estimate of $144.67 billion, according to data compiled by LSEG.
Big Tech is spending enormous amounts of money on processors, data centers and networking equipment as the companies rush to build out their AI infrastructure. The top 4 hyperscalers - Amazon, Microsoft (MSFT.O) , Alphabet’s Google (GOOGL.O) and Meta (META.O) - are expected to collectively spend more than $500 billion this year.
But tech earnings over the past few days have shown that Wall Street has a clear message for tech companies: Soaring AI spending can continue only if companies show commensurate operational or financial returns.
Google’s eye-watering capex forecast of $175 billion to $185 billion for the year got a pass from investors as the company delivered stellar growth in its cloud revenue, as did Meta’s plan to spend between $115 billion and $135 billion.
But investors punished Microsoft’s stock last week after its cloud unit growth just squeaked past estimates.
For Amazon, the largest cloud services provider in the world, enterprise demand for both AI infrastructure and core digital migration workloads has been strong, even as industrywide capacity constraints limit its ability to fully meet the demand.
The company invested heavily in the fourth quarter to ease those constraints. It launched its AI infrastructure project “Rainier”, bringing nearly half a million of its in-house Trainium2 chips online, primarily for use by Claude chatbot-maker Anthropic.
Although a smaller unit for Amazon, contributing just 15% to 20% to overall sales, AWS generates over 60% of the company’s operating profit.
Amazon has also been investing in its e-commerce business, seeking to draw more customers by expanding to rural areas in the United States, boosting its same-day and next-day delivery capabilities and deepening its push into perishable foods.
The company has been making major changes in its retail division, the latest bet being an expansion of its Whole Foods footprint and a 225,000-square-foot mega-store meant to compete with the likes of Walmart (WMT.N) and Costco (COST.O) .

Amazon's financial report, explained in one place!

Amazon.com projects $200 billion in capital expenditures for 2026, reflecting ongoing investments in AI infrastructure alongside other Big Tech firms. The company aims to enhance its cloud services and e-commerce capabilities, despite industry capacity constraints. Amazon's AWS unit, while smaller, significantly contributes to its operating profit. The company is also expanding its retail presence, including Whole Foods and a new mega-store to compete with Walmart and Costco.

- Amazon.com projects nearly $200 billion in capital expenditures for 2026, indicative of ongoing major investments in AI infrastructure, alongside other Big Tech firms.  
- The company faces industrywide constraints impacting its ability to meet strong enterprise demand, despite significant investments to alleviate these issues, including its AI project "Rainier."  
- While Amazon’s AWS generates substantial profits, the company is also enhancing its e-commerce operations to attract more customers, including expanding its Whole Foods reach and improving delivery capabilities.

Reuters

Proshares UltraPro QQQ

Direxion Daily AMZN Bull 2X Shares

Roundhill AMZN WeeklyPay ETF

iShares US Digital Infrastructure and Real Estate ETF

Franklin Exponential Data ETF

Amplify Online Retail ETF

Pacer Data & Infrastructure Real Estate ETF

Global X E-commerce ETF

VanEck Retail ETF

SPDR S&P Retail ETF

Global X Cloud Computing ETF

GraniteShares 2x Long AMZN Daily ETF

Amazon

Global X Data Center & Dgtl Infrs ETF

Proshares Big Data Refiners ETF

ProShares Online Retail

Amazon projects $200 billion in capital spending this year