Big Tech Continues To Buy Semiconductors At Record Levels In 2022
October 19, 2022
Beth Kindig
Lead Tech Analyst
This article was originally published on Forbes Oct 14, 2022,09:31am EDT
Semiconductors have been rocked this year due to slower consumer spending on PCs, mobile and also slowing enterprise budgets that further affect hardware purchases, including PCs, notebooks and servers. The silver lining is Capex spending by Big Tech companies, which we’ve covered in the past for our premium members, when we stated that the increased Capex from companies like Google, Microsoft and Amazon and other big tech companies greatly benefit the semiconductor market.
The news has been in an uproar about crypto mining and the consumer-related PC markets. However, it has been our stance for some time that Big Tech capex is the true leading indicator for AI semiconductor companies. Despite an enormous increase in Big Tech capex primarily driven by data centers, this line item does not get the attention it deserves in terms of follow-through to the semiconductor industry. Below, we look at FY2022 budgets to draw the conclusion that H2 spending on data center chips is equal if not greater than the first half of 2022.
Market Opportunity
According to Gartner, the overall IT spending is expected to grow 3% to $4.5 trillion in 2022. It is lower than the 10% growth in 2021. The slowdown was mainly due to the cutdown in spending on personal computers, tablets, and printers.
The Data Center Systems segment, however, is expected to grow fastest among all the segments. It is expected to grow 11% YoY to $212 billion, higher than the 6.4% growth in 2021.
Hyperscale data centers, which are very large data centers primarily operated by Amazon, Microsoft and Google, are expected to outpace overall data center systems.
According to data from Allied Market Research, the global hyperscale data center market is expected to grow from $59 billion in 2020 to $585 billion by the year 2030, representing a Compound Annual Growth Rate of 26% from 2021 to 2030.
Similarly, the Artificial Intelligence chip market is expected to grow from $8.02 billion in 2020 to $194.90 billion by the year 2030, representing a CAGR of 37% from 2021 to 2030.
According to a report published by Dell’Oro Group, the global data center Capex is expected to be $377 billion by the year 2026 – which implies the majority of the growth noted by Allied Market Research will occur in the next few years.
The private markets are also signaling growth will continue as there has been quite a bit of deal activity in data centers.
According to data from Synergy Research Group, 87 data center focused merger and acquisition deals were closed in the first half of 2022, worth $24 billion. There is an additional $18 billion of pending deals in the pipeline that are agreed and are yet to be officially closed. The research group mentioned that 209 deals were closed in 2021 for over $48 billion, up 41% from 2020.
One of the more significant deals this year that was completed is the acquisition of CyrusOne for $15 billion by KKR and Global Investment Partners. John Dinsdale, Chief Analyst at Synergy Research Group, said, “There is an ever-increasing demand for data center capacity, driven by rapidly growing cloud markets, aggressive expansion of hyperscale operator networks and continued growth of data-rich digital services.”
Earnings season kicked off this week and our premium members are receiving deep-dive tech earnings analysis straight to their inbox each week. We also offer real-time trade notifications, weekly webinars, a completely transparent portfolio of 20+ positions and more. Learn more about our premium membership.
Big Tech Capex H2 2022
Alphabet’s Q2 Capex grew by 24% YoY to $6.9 billion. Ruth Porat, CFO of Alphabet, said, “Turning to CapEx. The largest investments in the second quarter were in servers followed by data centers and office facilities.” The company had invested $24.6 billion in Capex in the year 2021, up 11% YoY. The management expects Capex to rise in 2022. In the Q2 2022 earnings call, Ruth Porat said, “We continue to expect an increase in CapEx in 2022 versus last year. For the balance of 2022, the increase will be particularly reflected in investments in technical infrastructure globally with servers as the largest component.” Earlier this year, the company announced its plan to invest about $9.5 billion in data centers and offices in the U.S. for the year 2022. This is up from about $7 billion spent in 2021.
Similarly, Microsoft’s Capex including financial leases, grew by 19% YoY to $8.7 billion in the Q4 FY2022 quarter (i.e., Q2 CY2022). Amy Hood, CFO of Microsoft, said, “Maybe let me start by talking about Q4's capital spend. Obviously, the big driver of our growth this quarter was in data center spend, both new and newbuilds as well as adding capacity to existing data centers. We are seeing, obviously, good demand signal.” The management expects a sequential decrease in the next quarter due to the normal variability in the quarterly spend. In the CY 2021, Microsoft’s Capex including financial leases, grew by 33% YoY to $27.5 billion.
Amazon incurred capital expenditures, including equipment financial leases, of about $60 billion in 2021. About 40% of this is made up of technology infrastructure supporting AWS and worldwide stores business. The management expects Capex to increase over the last year with the increase in technology infrastructure.
Brian Olsavsky, senior VP and CFO, said in the Q2 2022 earnings call, “For full-year 2022, we do expect to spend slightly more on capital investments than last year, but the proportion of capital spending shifts among our businesses. We expect technology infrastructure spend to grow year-over-year, primarily to support the rapid growth in innovation we are seeing with AWS. We expect infrastructure to represent a bit more than half of our total capital investments in 2022.”
Meta’s capital expenditures in Q2, including principal payments on finance leases were $7.75 billion, up 64% YoY. The company’s CFO, Dave Wehner, said in the Q2 earnings call, “Capital expenditures, including principal payments on finance leases, were $7.7 billion, driven by investments in servers, data centers and network infrastructure. The big step-up in CapEx, both year-over-year and sequentially related to server spend, including for our AI infrastructure.”
The company expects 2022 capital expenditures, including principal payments on financial leases, to be $32 billion at the mid-point of the guidance, representing a 66% YoY growth. Tracking the Capex in the first two quarters, Meta Platforms had spent $13.3 billion which suggests the spend will be higher in 2H 2022. When we deduct from the mid-point of the guidance, it comes to $18.7 billion for H2.
Meta also recently announced its plan to expand the Eagle Mountain data center project. It is Phase 3 expansion plan and brings the total investment in the project to over $1.5 billion.
Earnings season kicked off this week and our premium members are receiving deep-dive tech earnings analysis straight to their inbox each week. We also offer real-time trade notifications, weekly webinars, a completely transparent portfolio of 20+ positions and more. Learn more about our premium membership.
Conclusion
Thanks to very big Big Tech capex budgets, Nvidia’s data center revenue grew 71% YoY to $7.6 billion in 1H 2022. Similarly, AMD’s data center revenue grew by 83% YoY to $1.5 billion in Q2 2022 and doubled in Q1 2022.
Due to consumer-related weakness, the data center is now the leading segment for these companies, which we had predicted would occur in 2018 in my free weekly newsletter. We also provide regular deep dives for our premium research Members on a more granular level as to what will happen next in the semiconductor industry.
Royston Roche, Financial Analyst for the I/O Fund contributed to this article.
Gains of up to 403% from our Free Newsletter.
Here are sample stock gains from the I/O Fund’s newsletter --- produced weekly and all for free!
+344% on Nvidia
+403% on Bitcoin
+218% on Roku
*as of March 15, 2022
Our newsletter provides an edge in the world’s most valuable industry – technology. Due to the enormous gains from this particular industry, we think it’s essential that every stock investor have a credible source who specializes in tech. Subscribe for Free Weekly Analysis on the Best Tech Stocks.
If you are a more serious investor, we have a premium service that offers lower entries and real-time trade alerts. Sample returns on the premium site include 324% on Zoom, 601% on Nvidia, 445% on Bitcoin, and 4-digits on an alt-coin. The I/O Fund is audited annually to prove it’s one of the best performing Funds on the market with returns that beat Wall Street funds.
More To Explore
Newsletter
The Strongest Cybersecurity Stocks In Q3
Cybersecurity stocks have performed well in 2023, rising about +26.5% YTD, with the security backdrop boosted by an increase in data breaches and ransomware.
Nvidia’s Fiscal Q3 Earnings Preview: The Pressure Is On
Nvidia has surged this year with 241% gains YTD, which has more than doubled the returns of the FAANGs. This is no small feat considering it’s widely understood Big Tech is holding up the broader mark
Apple’s Services Growth Flywheel Continues To Strengthen
Apple’s Services segment was one of the brightest spots in a relatively in-line earnings report at the beginning of November, topping an $85 billion run rate as growth jumped back to the high double-d
Tesla Sells 33% Of Vehicles Below Average Cost, BYD Pulls Ahead
BYD more than doubled Tesla’s China sales in October as Tesla’s sales slipped on a month-over-month basis, while NEV startups showed strong sales numbers across the board. China’s new energy vehicle (
Solar Stocks Still Searching For A Bottom
Solar is arguably one of the market’s most sold-off industries at the moment, with the Invesco Solar ETF falling more than 42% YTD as the industry struggles to find growth in a high-rate environment.
Five Stocks (Not Seven) Can Lead to New Highs
The majority of other sectors are confirming a continuation of the 2022 bear market, meanwhile, a handful of big tech names, with outsized weighting in the major indexes, suggest that they want to go
Big Tech Stocks: Q3 Earnings Preview
Earnings season has officially kicked off, with Big Tech headlining a busy week next week: Microsoft and Google report on Tuesday, followed by Meta on Wednesday, and Amazon on Thursday. Big Tech stock
AI Could Be Apple’s Next Chapter
After Nvidia added $750 billion in value this year on the backs of surging AI chip demand, investors are quickly searching for the next trillion-dollar AI winner. AI is the best investment opportunity
AI is the Best Investment Opportunity of our Lifetime: Video Interview
Real Vision invited Beth Kindig back for a candid interview with Raoul Pal for a one-hour discussion on how to position for AI. As discussed in the interview, the reason that AI will be the best inves
The Next Market AI Will Disrupt Is Cybersecurity
Cybersecurity is one of the highest costs that enterprises face at 12% of IT budgets on average, and this cost is rapidly rising. While a company can lay off staff or reduce marketing and R&D expenses