Artificial Intelligence▲impact 4
Oracle capex surge and AI bottlenecks spotlight hidden supply-chain winners
Oracle shares fell about 11% after the company reported that capital spending for fiscal 2026 reached $55 billion, exceeding its $50 billion target, and outlined plans for $70 billion in fiscal 2027. The spending ramp is tied to a $638 billion remaining performance obligation backlog, more than half of which comes from OpenAI, while prepaid AI contracts total $75 billion. Motley Fool contributors noted that the rush by AI firms to go public—including the upcoming SpaceX IPO and confidential filings by OpenAI and Anthropic—is driven by massive capital needs and a favorable market. They identified bottlenecks in the AI build-out, highlighting PDF Solutions for chip-defect detection, Prologis for its data-center power capacity and 3,000 development-ready acres, and Japanese firms Nitto Boseki and Ajinomoto for specialized chip materials. The discussion also touched on the persistent valuation gap between U.S. and European stocks, with Exor NV cited as a holding company trading at 0.4 times book value.