2026-02-04T22:25:43.572Z
- Alphabet shares fell 2% after reporting fourth-quarter results on Wednesday.
- Google’s parent company is aggressively increasing capital investment in AI infrastructure.
- Big Tech companies are increasing spending as the AI race continues.
Alphabet has significantly increased spending on chips and data centers this year, underscoring its commitment to investing in AI amid cost concerns on Wall Street.
Google’s parent company forecasts capital spending of $175 billion to $185 billion in 2026, nearly double what it invested in property, plant and equipment last year, the company said in its fourth-quarter earnings report Wednesday. In October, Google predicted that capital spending in 2025 would be between $91 billion and $93 billion.
Google’s stock price fell 2% following the earnings release.
The company attributed the large increase in spending to meeting customer demand.
“We are seeing our investments in AI and infrastructure driving revenue and growth across the board,” the company said in its fourth-quarter earnings call.
Those numbers won’t come as a surprise to anyone who has followed Big Tech’s spending patterns throughout the AI race. Microsoft, Meta, and Amazon are all aggressively increasing spending.
In earnings calls with investors last week, both Meta and Microsoft said their 2025 spending was higher than originally expected.
Both companies’ sales for the quarter exceeded Wall Street expectations, but only Meta’s stock rose on the news. Microsoft stock fell more than 6% as the market digested news of higher-than-expected capital spending.
Investors have expressed concern about Microsoft’s backlog, with about half of it coming from a single customer, OpenAI.
