Five of the largest US technology companies returned a record-low share of their cash to shareholders in the first nine months of 2026 as AI spending absorbed it, according to a Reuters analysis summarized by The Next Web. Microsoft, Alphabet, Amazon, Meta and Oracle cut their share buybacks by 83%, to $13.6 billion from $81.8 billion a year earlier. Reuters found their combined payouts equaled 9.3% of the cash they generated, down from 27.4% and the lowest share in at least 15 years of data. Reuters’ original was not opened for this article; the figures below come from TNW’s account of it, and from CNBC, TechCrunch and earlier Reuters and Bloomberg reporting where cited.

What the Reuters figures show

The analysis uses LSEG data and company reports for the first nine months of the year. Operating cash flow at the five companies rose 29% to a record $542.9 billion. Capital spending roughly doubled to $556.9 billion, which TNW, citing Reuters, says exceeded operating cash flow for the first time in data going back to 2011. That left a combined free cash flow deficit of $14 billion, compared with a surplus of $143.5 billion in the same period of 2025.

Dividends moved the other way, rising to $37 billion from $33.9 billion. Together with buybacks, total payouts came to $50.6 billion. Reuters found that this was funded by cash reserves, borrowing or share sales rather than by free cash flow, since there was none. Dividing $50.6 billion by $542.9 billion gives the 9.3% share.

TNW explains why the buyback line matters to investors: repurchases spread profits across fewer shares, which can raise earnings per share even when profits stay flat. ING, cited in the same report, estimates that Alphabet’s share count fell 9.5% between the end of 2020 and 2025, which added about 2% a year to its earnings per share. Lens analysis: with Alphabet no longer buying back stock, that effect has stopped.

The sharp rise in spending was visible earlier in the year. In a July 22 report carried by Khaleej Times, Reuters said LSEG consensus for the five companies’ capital spending in the current year had climbed from about $485 billion in January to about $730 billion, and noted that capital spending figures cover all investment, not only AI, because companies do not consistently disclose AI-specific amounts. Bloomberg reported in June that, among the four biggest AI spenders, only Microsoft had repurchased shares in the first quarter.

Company by company

Alphabet and Meta made no buybacks in 2026, according to the Reuters analysis as summarized by TNW. The two had bought back a combined $66.5 billion in the first nine months of 2025. Alphabet raised about $12.4 billion from share sales and $29 billion from debt this year. CNBC reports that Alphabet’s free cash flow was negative $9.07 billion in the latest quarter, and TechCrunch says quarterly capital spending rose to $51.4 billion.

Meta’s free cash flow was negative $2.12 billion in the third quarter, which CNBC describes as the first negative result for the company. On Monday, October 26, Meta announced plans to raise $95 billion to fund its AI work, starting with $35 billion in underwritten public equity offerings and followed by $60 billion through an at-the-market program, CNBC reports. S&P Global Ratings then lowered its outlook on Meta’s AA- rating from stable to negative on Friday. S&P said it is unclear when revenue from Meta’s new products will make a material contribution, and a Meta spokesperson replied that it respectfully disagrees with S&P’s view of its ability to earn from AI.

Amazon pays no dividend and, per TNW’s account of the Reuters work, has not repurchased shares since 2022. It raised $48.1 billion in long-term debt in the third quarter. CNBC reports that Amazon’s third-quarter capital spending was $77.3 billion, up from $35.1 billion a year earlier, and that it held its 2026 forecast at $220 billion. The $42.4 billion free cash flow outflow that Amazon reported is a trailing twelve-month figure, according to CNBC’s earnings report; some summaries of the results drop that qualifier.

Microsoft made almost all of the buybacks that remain, but cut them to $4.4 billion in the September quarter from $5.7 billion, Reuters found. CNBC reports that Microsoft is the only hyperscaler still producing positive free cash flow, at $18.63 billion in its latest quarter, though that was down 27%. Even so, Microsoft announced a $25 billion bond sale on Thursday, expected to close on November 4. The proceeds are for general corporate purposes, which its statement says can include working capital, capital expenditures, share repurchases, acquisitions and repaying debt.

Oracle is the least discussed of the five in the sources reviewed. Reuters reported in July that the company’s capital spending of $55.7 billion in its fiscal year ended in May was 174% of its operating cash flow of $32 billion, and that it planned to raise $45 billion to $50 billion through debt and equity. This week, CNBC reports, Oracle said it would raise $10 billion in new debt and expects to return to positive free cash flow in the second half of its fiscal 2028. Because Oracle and Microsoft report on fiscal calendars that differ from the calendar year, TNW’s summary does not make clear how the nine-month totals were aligned.

How the companies and analysts explain it

The companies say the spending will pay off. Amazon chief executive Andy Jassy told analysts on Thursday that Amazon has a “clear line of sight to attractive financial returns,” CNBC reports, and that the company will spend meaningfully more in 2027. CNBC reports that Microsoft’s spending is aimed at meeting heavy demand from the AI labs Anthropic and OpenAI, plus other customers.

Analysts describe a change in how large companies use their cash. Ehren Stanhope, co-head of investment management at Franklin Templeton, said in the Reuters report that for 15 years companies increasingly handed excess capital back to shareholders, and that the current period may involve more issuance of equity and debt, which means a bigger demand for capital from investors. TradeStation’s David Russell, quoted by Reuters in July, put the investor concern more bluntly: “Companies exist to make money, not spend money.”

The lenders’ view is also shifting. CNBC reports that investors have grown more cautious about companies carrying large debt loads as central banks raise interest rates to fight inflation. Microsoft’s AAA rating from S&P puts it at the top of the scale, whereas S&P’s change for Meta is an outlook revision, not a downgrade: the AA- rating itself stays in place.

Why it matters

For shareholders, buybacks had become one of the main ways Big Tech returned money. Lens analysis: the Reuters numbers show that this route has largely closed for the two companies that have stopped altogether, and narrowed for Microsoft, while dividends rose by about 9%. The 83% drop in buybacks is therefore less a change in policy announced by any company than the arithmetic result of capital spending that is now larger than operating cash flow.

The size of the obligations suggests that this is not a short-term adjustment. TNW’s separate report on a Bloomberg tally says the same five companies hold more than $3 trillion in AI build-out commitments, a figure that includes leases that can run for decades. If those commitments are met, the call on cash continues whatever happens to share prices. This suggests the financing mix, rather than the buyback line alone, is the thing to follow.

Not everyone reads the same data as a warning. As CNBC reports, one fund manager argued in the same week that Alphabet’s $9 billion cash outflow is small relative to its business. The Reuters figures do not say whether the investments will earn their cost, only that for now they are being paid for with borrowed money and new shares as well as cash flow.

What to watch

A few dates and data points will show whether the pattern holds. Microsoft’s bond sale is due to close on November 4. Meta’s $95 billion equity plan, announced on October 26, is structured in two stages. Oracle’s target of positive free cash flow in the second half of fiscal 2028 gives a long horizon against which its borrowing can be measured. S&P says it expects Meta’s capital spending growth to level off starting in 2028, but is less certain that Meta will curtail spending as previously anticipated.

The simplest signal would be a return of buybacks at Alphabet or Meta, which would indicate cash flow has caught up with spending. Neither company had announced one in the sources reviewed. Until then, the Reuters data frame the AI build-out as something the biggest companies are funding with a mix of cash, debt and equity, at the expense of the shareholder payouts investors had come to expect.

Sources

Image: Wall Street Sign Close-up with American Flags (50849584006).jpg by Billie Grace Ward from New York, USA, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons. Illustrative photo; it does not show the events described.