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Thu, 30 Apr 2026

Thu, 30 Apr 2026 Meta shares slide as investors weigh Big Tech's AI spending spree

Meta, Amazon, Alphabet and Microsoft all reported earnings at the same time on Wednesday.
Meta's shares plummeted 7% in extended trading after announcing plans to increase its capital expenditure on artificial intelligence (AI) projects by up to $10 billion, bringing the total spending to as much as $145 billion. The company's quarterly earnings report revealed that it underestimated its AI compute needs and would need to spend more to meet them. Meta's CEO Mark Zuckerberg acknowledged that the company doesn't have a precise plan for how each product will scale with AI, but is confident in its ability to lead the field. In contrast, Alphabet (Google's parent company) saw its stock jump 7% after reporting a 30% increase in profits and plans to "significantly increase" spending on AI next year. The company attributed its growth to increased demand for cloud services driven by AI usage. Microsoft's shares fell nearly 2%, but ticked back up as the company beat revenue expectations with a 16% increase to $83 billion. However, its free cash flow took a hit due to high spending on AI projects. Amazon's shares also fell after it reported lower-than-expected earnings for next quarter, but the company's stock was still up 2.7% in extended trading. Amazon notched a 15% year-over-year increase in profits and saw growth in its cloud business. The four tech giants - Meta, Alphabet, Microsoft, and Amazon - have committed over $650 billion to AI projects this year alone, sparking concerns about the sustainability of the AI boom and the potential impact on their finances.