谷歌、亚马逊、Meta、微软和甲骨文这五家云计算巨头的利润仍在上升，但扣除资本开支后的现金流却在下滑。分析师预计，亚马逊、Meta和微软今年至少有一个季度会出现负现金流，Alphabet勉强维持，甲骨文则已处于最弱位置。

今年这五家公司将投入8000亿美元用于建设仓库和采购计算设备，以运行人工智能模型，资本支出约占收入的40%，超过了2010年代页岩繁荣期的石油行业和1990年代互联网泡沫期的电信业。与此同时，未来收入承诺已从去年的7300亿美元跃升至2万亿美元，资产负债表也变得更复杂、更重资产且更依赖债务。

自去年初以来，五大公司已从债券市场融资2600亿美元，占美国上市非金融企业全部借款的四分之一。表外义务同样激增：未来数据中心租赁付款达8200亿美元，远高于一年前的2700亿美元，另外还有6800亿美元的芯片和其他支出承诺；这场AI资本开支狂潮已把压力传导到整个科技供应链，并让英伟达、博通、美光和SanDisk等芯片企业受益。

The profits of the five big cloud-computing firms—Amazon, Google, Meta, Microsoft and Oracle—are still rising, but the cashflow left after capital spending is falling. Analysts expect Amazon, Meta and Microsoft to report negative cashflows in at least one quarter this year, Alphabet to barely stay above water, and Oracle to remain the weakest.

This year the five firms will spend $800bn on warehouses and computing equipment for AI models, with capex equal to about 40% of revenues and larger than the shares of the oil industry in the 2010s shale boom and the telecoms industry in the 1990s dotcom bubble. Future revenue commitments have jumped from $730bn last year to $2trn, while the balance sheets have become more complex, more asset-heavy and more indebted.

Since the start of last year, the big five have raised $260bn in bond markets, equal to a quarter of all borrowing by listed US non-financial firms. Off-balance-sheet obligations have also surged: future data-centre lease payments are $820bn, up from $270bn a year ago, and other commitments add another $680bn; the AI spending boom is now feeding the wider tech supply chain and lifting chip makers such as Nvidia, Broadcom, Micron and Sandisk.

Source: Big tech is sacrificing its cashflows to prop up the AI boom

Subtitle: The result is increasingly unsettling

Dateline: 5月 14, 2026 11:25 上午