Meta announces $95B offering to fund AI

Meta is issuing new stock for the first time since 2013, announcing a $95 billion offering to fund its AI buildout. About $60 billion will come in the form of new, nonvoting shares that the company created last week, a move that telegraphed its rapacious need for cash and CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s desire to raise it without diluting his control stake (and pay his tax bill).

The offering tops Google’s $85 billion and Oracle’s $25 billion announced stock sales this year.

All three show how the AI boom is stretching corporate balance sheets: The biggest cash-cow businesses in the world can no longer support it, and borrowing can no longer fill the gap. Hyperscalers are expected to spend $800 billion on AI this year and more than $1 trillion next year. Meta shares are up 2% premarket, suggesting that while credit investors are scared, stockholders are still sanguine.