在过去两周里，Alphabet、Amazon、Meta 和 Microsoft 公布了今年资本支出计划超过 7400 亿美元，华尔街将其解读为包括数据中心和芯片在内的人工智能基础设施支出。
在人工智能繁荣的早期，投资者大多奖励此类巨额支出，视其为对该技术增长潜力的信心标志。但随着我们进入第四季度，这种热情似乎正让位于对自由现金流为负（支出多于收入）、债务累积以及这些巨额投资是否最终能产生足够回报的担忧。
焦虑情绪在周五蔓延至整个市场。纳斯达克指数下跌 2.9%，芯片股也遭受重创：英伟达下跌 4%，博通下跌超过 5%，高通下跌 11%。Alphabet 周四暴跌 12%，创下其历史最差单日表现，抹去了 5000 亿美元的市场价值，周五再次下跌。
与此同时，AI Mode —— 直接内置于搜索中的谷歌 AI 驱动聊天机器人功能 —— 的巨大成功正在侵蚀公司的赚钱机器。谷歌搜索广告业务约占其收入的一半，其增速放缓至 12%，为五个季度以来的最慢增速。这让谷歌走钢丝：它正在花费数十亿美元开发可能破坏为其带来收入的搜索业务的 AI 技术。
值得注意的是，支付所有这些人工智能基础设施的资金不仅仅来自大型科技公司的利润。它也体现在股票和债券销售中。根据标普全球市场情报（S&P Global Market Intelligence），Microsoft、Alphabet、Amazon、Meta 和 Oracle 在 2026 年共筹集了$326 billion债务，是去年的三倍。
Rebecca Bellan 是 TechCrunch 的高级记者，负责报道塑造人工智能的商业、政策和新兴趋势。她的作品也曾刊登在《福布斯》、彭博社、《大西洋月刊》、《每日野兽》和其他出版物上。
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Investors are getting nervous about AI infrastructure spending just as the Big Tech companies double down.
Over the past two weeks, Alphabet, Amazon, Meta, and Microsoft have outlined plans to spend more than $740 billion on capital expenditures this year, which Wall Street is reading as AI infrastructure spending, including data centers and chips.
Earlier in the AI boom, investors largely rewarded such big outlays, viewing them as a sign of confidence in the technology’s growth potential. But as we enter the fourth quarter, that enthusiasm seems to be giving way to concerns about negative free cash flow (spending more cash than a company brings in), mounting debt, and whether these enormous investments will ever generate enough returns.
The anxiety spilled across the market on Friday. The Nasdaq fell 2.9%, and chip stocks took a drubbing, too: Nvidia dropped 4%, Broadcom more than 5%, and Qualcomm 11%. Alphabet, which plummeted 12% on Thursday, its worst day on record, wiping out $500 billion in market value, fell again.
A big part of the concern is that companies that used to have overflowing free cash flow from their core businesses are getting hit as AI threatens the economics of those businesses. Alphabet provided the clearest example of that this week. Google’s parent company reported negative free cash flow of $9.1 billion in the third quarter, its second consecutive quarter in the red, even as quarterly capex grew to $51.4 billion. Alphabet expects to spend up to $205 billion this year, and expects that spending to keep rising in 2027.
Meanwhile, the wild success of AI Mode — Google’s AI-powered chatbot feature built directly into Search — is eating into the company’s money-maker. Google’s Search advertising business, which makes up roughly half of its revenue, saw growth slow to 12%, its weakest pace in five quarters. That leaves Google walking a tightrope. It’s spending billions on the AI technology that could undermine the search business that pays it.
Amazon is in a similar boat after reporting negative free cash flow of $42.4 billion over the past 12 months, compared with $14.8 billion in positive free cash flow the year before. The company says it expects to spend $220 billion in capex this year. Even though revenue at its cloud business, AWS, grew 39%, Amazon’s stock tumbled 7% after it reported earnings Thursday.
Meta is also burning cash, reporting negative free cash flow of $2.1 billion in the third quarter as capex outpaced its operating cash. It’s guiding to as much as $145 billion in capex this year. The company noted that Muse, its new free personal AI agent, is a bit of a money pit (it’s “very compute-intensive to run,” CEO Mark Zuckerberg has said). But ad revenue grew 26%. Still, no amount of good news saved Meta from taking a 10% hit on its stock last week.
Microsoft was the only exception when it came to free cash flow — it recorded $18.6 billion in positive free cash flow in its latest quarter, with spending on capex at $45.2 billion, less than the $50 billion it projected. Microsoft said that wasn’t an intentional pullback from AI spending, blaming delays in capacity from third-party providers. As a result, shares of smaller companies that rent out AI computing power sank.
It’s worth noting that the money to pay for all of this AI infrastructure isn’t just coming from the Big Tech companies’ profits. It’s also showing up in stock and bond sales. According to S&P Global Market Intelligence, Microsoft, Alphabet, Amazon, Meta, and Oracle raised a combined $326 billion in debt in 2026, triple the amount raised last year.
Demand for AI compute remains strong. Google, Amazon, and Microsoft all saw gains in their cloud businesses. But investors are getting spooked by the costs of meeting that demand.
These muddied waters could complicate Anthropic’s highly anticipated IPO. The AI company filed to go public earlier this week, and its future growth depends on securing enormous amounts of compute. Financial Times reported Friday that Blackstone has warned investors the company might not qualify for an investment-grade rating after its IPO, meaning it might end up being more reliant on the hyperscalers and third-parties to fund its infrastructure ambitions.
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Rebecca Bellan is a senior reporter at TechCrunch where she covers the business, policy, and emerging trends shaping artificial intelligence. Her work has also appeared in Forbes, Bloomberg, The Atlantic, The Daily Beast, and other publications.
You can contact or verify outreach from Rebecca by emailing [email protected] or via encrypted message at rebeccabellan.491 on Signal.
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