How Apple’s Contrarian ‘Nah, We’re Good’ Strategy Defies Amazon, Microsoft, Alphabet
- Finance
ThePostMaster- 0
- 8 minutes read
Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) is the odd one out in Big Tech’s AI spending race.
While the rest of the Magnificent 7 are collectively committing around $700 billion in capital expenditure (capex) over the next year, Apple cut its own spending 19% year-over-year last quarter to $2.37 billion.
The chart, published by A16Z, captures the gap visually.
Since 2014, Apple’s quarterly capex line has barely moved. Every other Big Tech line has turned parabolic.
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Amazon.com Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) is guiding to $200 billion in capex for 2026 alone.
Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ:MSFT) has increased capex 89% year-over-year, while Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) raised capital expenditures by 95% and Meta Platforms Inc. (NASDAQ:META) by 48%.
Most of the increased spend is going toward AI data centers, chips, and infrastructure, and a good portion of that money flows directly to Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA)
Apple’s full-year spend was $12.72 billion. That is less than Amazon plans to spend in a single quarter.
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Bigger is not necessarily better. When Amazon announced its $200 billion capex guidance, its stock dropped about 8% in the following session.
Alphabet’s similarly aggressive plans sent its stock down roughly 6%.
Investors are getting nervous about whether these companies will ever see a return on the unprecedented investment.
CEO Tim Cook has defended Apples approach directly.
“From a CapEx point of view, we’ve always taken a very prudent and deliberate approach to our expenditure and we continue to leverage a hybrid model, which I think continues to serve us well,” he forecasted on Apple’s Q1 2025 earnings call.
Apple is relying on on-device processing and “private cloud compute” to avoid the massive server costs burdening its rivals.
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Prediction markets may offer the clearest read yet on who investors actually think wins this bet long-term, and they appear skeptical Apple’s restraint pays off over the longer arc.
On Polymarket’s “Largest Company End Of December 2026?” market, which has over $626,000 in volume, Nvidia leads at 44 cents, Alphabet sits at 33 cents, and Apple is at just 14 cents.
