NEW YORK, Feb 7, 2026, 12:55 EST — Market closed
- Digital Realty, Equinix and Vertiv ended Friday sharply higher as traders returned to AI-linked infrastructure names
- Big Tech’s 2026 capex plans refocused the market on who benefits — and who pays
- Next week brings fresh read-throughs from Equinix earnings and more updates on power and capacity
U.S. data center stocks ended Friday with a broad lift, led by Digital Realty and Vertiv after a volatile week for AI-linked shares. Digital Realty closed up 4.1% at $171.62, Equinix rose 5.0% to $848.12 and Vertiv jumped 10.0% to $195.58; Iron Mountain climbed 7.7% to $95.78.
The move matters now because the group sits directly in the spending path of cloud companies expanding artificial-intelligence capacity, and investors are getting picky about what that spending buys. “Investors right now are not forgiving about large investments without clear signal on return on invested capital,” analysts at Morgan Stanley wrote. Reuters
That scrutiny sharpened after Amazon projected $200 billion in 2026 capital spending — money largely tied to servers, data centers and networking gear — a more than 50% jump from 2025. “The market just dislikes the substantial amount of money that keeps getting put into capex for these growth rates,” said Dave Wagner, portfolio manager at Aptus Capital Advisors. Reuters
Alphabet added to the debate this week by laying out a $175 billion to $185 billion capital spending target for 2026 as it tries to ease compute constraints. CEO Sundar Pichai told analysts, “We’ve been supply-constrained,” and said the higher spend was aimed at future capacity. Reuters
Digital Realty’s results and outlook helped frame the bull case for listed data-center landlords. CEO Andy Power said “power became the industry’s primary constraint” as AI adoption accelerated, and the company set 2026 core funds from operations (FFO) guidance at $7.90 to $8.00 a share; core FFO is a cash-flow measure widely used by real estate investment trusts. The Motley Fool
The bounce in data center names came as Wall Street closed out a strong Friday session, with chipmakers leading a broader rebound even as Amazon slid. “There’s real demand for AI products,” said Ross Mayfield, investment strategy analyst at Baird, calling the trade “volatile” but supported by the need for spending. Reuters
For data center stocks, the argument has shifted back and forth between demand and constraints. Demand is easy to point to — enterprise AI workloads and cloud growth — but the choke points are physical: land, permitting, power hookups, and the equipment chain that feeds buildouts.
There is also a familiar REIT issue under the surface. Data center operators finance big construction pipelines, and higher borrowing costs can bite just as quickly as higher pricing helps, especially if the market suddenly decides growth is slowing.
The risk scenario is straightforward: hyperscalers slow orders, or power availability tightens further, and investors reprice the sector fast. Another problem would be the reverse — too much capacity chasing the same tenants a few years out — with lower renewals and weaker pricing power.
Next week’s calendar will give investors more company-level signals. Equinix is scheduled to hold its fourth-quarter 2025 earnings conference call on Feb. 11 at 5:30 p.m. EST.
Iron Mountain is due to report fourth-quarter and full-year 2025 results before market hours on Feb. 12, with a conference call set for 8:30 a.m. Eastern Time, according to the company.
For Monday, the setup is simple: investors will test whether Friday’s bid was a one-day relief rally or the start of a steadier run into earnings, with capex headlines, capacity constraints and pricing commentary likely to move these stocks more than anything else.
