New York, 29 July 2026 – The financing race behind artificial intelligence is entering a more demanding phase as the world’s largest technology groups turn increasingly to bond markets to fund data centres, chips and power infrastructure. Investors are still buying, but they are asking for more yield and showing less willingness to absorb every deal at the aggressive prices issuers enjoyed earlier in the cycle.

Alphabet, Amazon, Meta, Microsoft and Oracle raised close to US$302 billion through debt and equity by 22 July, according to market estimates. The scale reflects how quickly capital spending has moved beyond what even cash-rich technology companies can comfortably fund from operating cash flow alone. AI infrastructure now requires land, grid connections, cooling systems, servers and long-term energy arrangements, turning software-led growth ambitions into a capital-intensive industrial build-out.