{"id":355987,"date":"2025-12-18T11:56:12","date_gmt":"2025-12-18T11:56:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/355987\/"},"modified":"2025-12-18T11:56:12","modified_gmt":"2025-12-18T11:56:12","slug":"us-tech-stocks-slide-as-oracle-data-centre-setback-reignites-ai-concerns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/355987\/","title":{"rendered":"US tech stocks slide as Oracle data centre setback reignites AI concerns"},"content":{"rendered":"

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US tech stocks fell on Wednesday, as news that Oracle has lost a key backer for a data centre project reignited investor concerns over soaring spending by artificial intelligence companies and the debt that is funding it.<\/p>\n

The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite dropped 1.8 per cent in New York to finish at its lowest level since late November. Oracle fell 5.4 per cent.<\/p>\n

The declines for the software company came after the Financial Times reported that Blue Owl Capital, the primary backer for Oracle\u2019s data centre projects in the US, will not fund a $10bn data centre<\/a> in Michigan.<\/p>\n

Oracle shares have fallen almost 46 per cent since they peaked in early September as the company finds itself at the centre of Wall Street\u2019s growing unease over the vast debt being taken on to fund the build-out of AI<\/a> infrastructure.<\/p>\n

\"Line<\/p>\n

Wednesday\u2019s moves follow a sell-off late last week sparked by earnings from Oracle and chipmaker Broadcom that fell short of lofty investor expectations.<\/p>\n

Other big tech stocks also fell on Wednesday. Nvidia was down 3.8 per cent, while Alphabet fell 3.1 per cent. Broadcom declined 4.5 per cent.<\/p>\n

\u201cOracle news is certainly the main factor [in tech stocks\u2019 renewed wobble],\u201d said Mike Zigmont, co-head of trading and research at Visdom Investment Group. Blue Owl\u2019s decision to pull out was being seen in the markets as \u201ca sign that they\u2019re not as bullish as [some investors] are\u201d on the AI boom, he added.<\/p>\n

In contrast to the gloomy sentiment, memory chip company Micron, an important Nvidia supplier, gave a bullish outlook following Wall Street\u2019s closing bell. The Idaho-based group said it expected to generate about $18.7bn in revenue for the current quarter, far above consensus estimates of $14.5bn, helping push its shares up 3.8 per cent in after-hours trading.<\/p>\n

Chief executive Sanjay Mehrotra said the company was benefiting from a constrained supply of the most advanced memory chips, which are required for training and running AI models in data centres. Micron shares were already up more than 160 per cent in the year to date.<\/p>\n

The blue-chip S&P 500 index dropped 1.2 per cent on Wednesday. Although the Wall Street benchmark has been dragged down by the renewed tech jitters in recent days, it remains not far below its record closing level from last week.<\/p>\n

Asian stocks followed Wall Street lower on Thursday. Japan\u2019s Topix opened down 0.4 per cent, while South Korea\u2019s Kospi fell 1.2 per cent and China\u2019s CSI 300 index retreated 0.3 per cent.<\/p>\n

The sell-off in tech prompted investors to seek the relative safety of defensive sectors, including consumer staples being the benchmark index\u2019s second-best performer and only a small decline for healthcare.<\/p>\n

Energy was the S&P 500\u2019s best-performing sector, gaining more than 2 per cent, as US President Donald Trump\u2019s plan to order a \u201ctotal and complete blockade<\/a>\u201d of sanctioned oil tankers travelling to and from Venezuela helped send the price of Brent crude 1.2 per cent higher.<\/p>\n

Arun Sai, a strategist at Pictet Asset Management, said the moves were probably a result of profit-taking by investors who have made money in AI-linked investments this year.<\/p>\n

\u201cInvestors are increasingly seeing their AI holdings as a funding source for next year\u2019s trades,\u201d Sai added.<\/p>\n

Additional reporting by Michael Acton in London<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Stay informed with free updates Simply sign up to the US equities myFT Digest — delivered directly to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":355988,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[256,254,255,64,63,105],"class_list":{"0":"post-355987","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-artificial-intelligence","8":"tag-ai","9":"tag-artificial-intelligence","10":"tag-artificialintelligence","11":"tag-au","12":"tag-australia","13":"tag-technology"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/355987","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=355987"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/355987\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/355988"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=355987"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=355987"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=355987"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}