Overview
- Google, Microsoft, Amazon and Meta raised outlays again, with AWS targeting $125 billion in 2025, Microsoft spending $35 billion in the latest quarter, Alphabet adding $6 billion to this year’s plan, and Meta guiding to at least $70 billion.
- The four reported about $112 billion in capital expenditures over the past three months and more than $360 billion in the past year as executives say demand still outstrips available compute.
- Market concentration has deepened, with Nvidia briefly touching a $5 trillion valuation and, together with six other tech leaders, accounting for roughly 32% of U.S. stock‑market value.
- Warnings intensified, with Bill Gates saying many AI bets will be “dead ends,” the Bank of England cautioning about rising use of debt, analysts flagging data‑center totals that could exceed $2 trillion, and estimates that a crash could erase $20 trillion in household wealth.
- Defenders argue this cycle differs from dot‑com as profits fund expansion, with Jerome Powell citing solid earnings and companies pointing to booked business, while the buildout continues through deals such as Nvidia’s HBM4 supply pact with Samsung and Intel’s reported talks to buy SambaNova.