Meta Set Its AI Budget to as Much as $145 Billion. Investors Aren't Sure They Like It.
The AI budget keeps growing. The stock hasn't kept up. Investors will be looking for answers in Meta's earnings report next week.
Overview
Meta Platforms (NASDAQ: META) now plans to spend $125 billion to $145 billion on capital expenditures in 2026 -- a range the company raised by $10 billion at both ends in April, mostly for AI (artificial intelligence) infrastructure. The market has answered with skepticism. The stock trades about 24% below its 52-week high of $796.25, and it fell another 3.4% on Thursday -- a rough day across big tech.
CEO Mark Zuckerberg isn't backing off. On the company's first-quarter earnings call, he said Meta is rolling out more than a gigawatt of custom chips it designed with Broadcom, part of an effort to get more out of every AI dollar it spends. And the message on the budget itself was unambiguous.
Details
"Compute is becoming increasingly important as it determines the quality of the services we can provide, including powering more capable models and delivering innovative new products," said chief financial officer Susan Li on the call. In addition, Li explained that its employees are increasingly relying on compute to "generate new ideas, run experiments, execute tasks, and build products."
Source
Originally published at www.fool.com.