Amazon has signed a deal to borrow about $17.5 billion from several financial lenders, adding to the company’s recent financing activity as major technology companies continue to fund large AI infrastructure projects.
The deal was reported by Bloomberg and comes as debt levels rise across parts of the technology sector. Reuters said the loan will be used for “general corporate purposes,” while TechCrunch said it has reached out to Amazon for more information.
Loan Gives Amazon Flexible Access To Funds
The lenders behind the loan reportedly include Citigroup, JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo, HSBC, and BofA Securities. The financing has been described as a delayed draw term loan, which allows Amazon to draw down the funds on its own timeline instead of taking the full amount upfront.
That structure gives Amazon flexibility over when and how the money is deployed. Amazon has not publicly detailed exactly how it plans to spend all of the new financing through a specific company announcement on its investor relations site.
Financing Reaches About $31.5 Billion In Two Days
The loan came two days after reports that Amazon would raise $14 billion through a Canadian bond sale. Together, the two financing actions bring Amazon’s new funding to about $31.5 billion in roughly 48 hours.
Reuters reported that Amazon issued a record-setting Canadian dollar-denominated corporate bond deal. The bond sale added to Amazon’s borrowing activity as it continues to invest in infrastructure and other corporate needs.
AI Infrastructure Spending Drives More Borrowing
TechCrunch reported that the loan comes as companies spend heavily to keep pace with AI infrastructure demands. Those costs include chips, data centers, and other systems needed to support AI services.
Amazon is not the only major technology company raising large sums for AI-related spending. Alphabet, Google’s parent company, said about a week earlier that it planned to raise $80 billion through a stock sale to help fund investments while maintaining a healthy balance sheet.
Meta has also announced plans to raise $30 billion through a bond sale. That would be its largest bond sale to date.
The scale of the borrowing has raised questions from investors and analysts about whether future returns will justify the spending. The question is no longer only whether AI infrastructure investment is needed, but whether the financial return will match the size of the capital being deployed.
Featured image credits: Wikimedia Commons
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