synopsis

Wells Fargo surmised that the companies are more discerning with leasing large clusters of power even as they tighten up pre-lease windows for capacity that would be delivered before the end of 2026.

Big Tech companies are allegedly reviewing their spending plans, especially for massive artificial intelligence (AI) investments they had eyed, amid the evolving macroeconomic and geopolitical environment.

A new note from Wells Fargo suggests Amazon, Inc. (AMZN), which has a thriving public cloud business in Amazon Web Services (AWS), has halted talks regarding leasing some colocation facilities, particularly in the overseas markets, The Fly reported.

A colocation data center is an operator renting space to house its hardware, including servers and other equipment, instead of having an on-premise space.

Citing multiple industry sources, the brokerage said it wasn’t clear yet how widespread the pause is. 

The remarks follow rumors of a similar development at fellow hyperscaler Microsoft Corp. (MSFT).

TD Cowen said in late February that Microsoft reportedly canceled leases in the U.S. with at least two private data center operators and stalled agreements that usually lead to formal leases.

Wells Fargo said it wasn’t sure whether AWS slowing some leases is an “area of concern” or just the “ebbs and flows of hyperscale activity.”

Allaying some of the concerns, the research firm said other hyperscalers such as Meta Platforms, Inc. (META), Alphabet, Inc. (GOOGL) (GOOG) and Oracle Corp. (ORCL) remained active.

Wells Fargo also noted that frontrunner Nvidia Corp. (NVDA), which manufactures the most high-performance chips to power AI applications, is seeing increased activity. 

The analyst surmised that companies are more discerning with leasing large power clusters even as they tighten up pre-lease windows for capacity that would be delivered before the end of 2026.

On the fourth-quarter earnings call held in early February, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy said the company would boost its capex to $100 billion 2025 from the $83 billion spent in the previous year, mainly toward AI for AWS. 

Since then, the macroeconomic outlook has worsened, as President Donald Trump’s “reciprocal tariffs” on trading partners have stirred recession talks. Companies typically preserve cash during an economic downturn to sustain their fundamentals.

Wells Fargo’s report comes just ahead of the big tech reporting season, with Google-parent Alphabet kicking off proceedings with its earnings report Thursday.

The Invesco QQQ Trust ETF (QQQ), which tracks the Nasdaq 100 Index — comprising the biggest non-financial tech stocks — continues to solicit ‘bearish’ sentiment (28/100) among retail traders on Stocktwits. The message volume on the QQQ stream stayed ‘normal.’

QQQ sentiment and message volume as of 12:17 a.m. ET, April 22 | source: Stocktwits

The negativity toward QQQ was premised on fears of an imminent financial crisis and a potential depression as Trump tariffs bite.

Amazon stock ended Monday’s session down 3.06% to $167.32, taking its year-to-date losses to nearly 27%. It also took a hit from Raymond James' comments that Trump tariffs will hurt the company’s supply chain.

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