Investors rushed into Amazon after-hours when the company revealed much stronger cloud growth and a higher spending plan, sending the stock up more than 9%. Management is leaning into that momentum by committing significantly more cash to infrastructure.
Amazon now expects to spend USD220 billion on capital investments this year, up from a prior forecast of USD200 billion. The company links much of that increase to the soaring cost of memory chips, which are critical to cloud and AI workloads. Executives caution that even this enlarged budget still leaves Amazon short of the capacity it expects to need in future years.
Amazon Web Services revenue climbed 37% in the second quarter to USD42.2 billion, far above the roughly 31% growth that analysts had pencilled in. That pace marks the fastest expansion for the cloud unit in 18 quarters, underlining how sharply demand has re-accelerated. Stronger sales suggest customers are not only maintaining existing usage but also rolling out new workloads in the cloud.
