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The AI spend machine is still humming
Big Tech apparently looked at the AI boom and said, “Yeah, let’s keep feeding it.” With 2026 spending plans topping $750 billion, the market is once again circling the picks-and-shovels names that help power the whole thing.
That matters because the AI trade isn’t just about the shiny chatbot names anymore. It’s also about the less glamorous stuff: memory, storage, power, cooling, and the plumbing that keeps giant data centers from melting into a very expensive puddle.
Who gets to sell the shovels?
The article points to a familiar cast of beneficiaries:
- Micron, Seagate, Western Digital, and SanDisk for memory/storage demand
- Vertiv for the data-center infrastructure angle
The basic pitch is that valuations still look reasonable even after the AI trade has been running laps around the market. So if Big Tech keeps writing giant checks, these stocks can benefit without needing to be the headline-grabbing AI darling.
Why investors should care
This is the kind of setup where the second-order winners can sometimes outperform the obvious names. If cloud giants keep spending like they’ve got a corporate credit card with no limit, the companies selling the chips, drives, racks, and cooling systems get the back-end boost.
Big picture: when AI capex stays sticky, the real money often trickles down to the unsexy infrastructure names everyone forgets until they’re suddenly back on the leaderboard.