Does actual data center construction match the hype?

$61 billion seems like a lot of money to spend in one year. On the other hand the market cap of the Magnificent Seven exceeds $22 trillion. Wooooo

Data center dollars don't match the hype

Nat Rubio Licht, The Deeper View

Dec 22, 2025

The AI data center boom was one of the biggest stories of 2025. But new numbers don't support the narrative — at least not yet.

A report from S&P Global found that more than $61 billion flowed into the data center market this year, remaining practically flat from the market’s 2024 investments of $60.8 billion. Deal volume fell from 129 deals in 2024 to 104 in 2025, highlighting that the value of these deals is increasing.

While $61 billion is certainly nothing to scoff at, it’s somewhat nominal when compared to the clusters of deals worth hundreds of billions each, inked by the likes of Oracle, Nvidia, OpenAI and others over the next several years. However, Rome wasn’t built in a day, and neither are AI data centers, Trevor Morgan, CEO of OpenDrives, told The Deep View.

“They're building out infrastructure, and that does not happen overnight,” he told me. “When you build out infrastructure like that, that is a long-term play. You're not building for current needs or needs a year from now, you are building out for the next five to 10 years.”

And AI bubble fears have caused investors and enterprises alike to drop into “wait and see mode,” said Morgan. Additionally, geopolitical uncertainty, supply chain constraints, and energy concerns have made some nervous about throwing their money on the table. Though Morgan said he expects deals to gradually rise over the next 12 to 18 months, for now, “a flat line means that we're still kind of waiting.”

“They're waiting for AI to really show the value, and ultimately it's going to be predicated on the companies that will leverage these services,” said Morgan.

Data center deals hit record $61 billion in 2025 amid construction frenzy

April Roach, CNBC

Published Fri, Dec 19 2025

More than $61 billion has flowed into the data center market so far this year.

Hyperscalers are increasingly turning to outside capital in the form of debt to fund the energy-intensive infrastructure.

S&P Global expects demand to continue to grow next year, despite high valuations and funding concerns leaving investor worried about a bubble.

Global data centers dealmaking surged to hit another record high this year, driven by a rush to build out the infrastructure required for energy-intensive AI workloads.

That surge came even as investors grew increasingly wary of inflated artificial intelligence valuations and the financing underpinning the rapid expansion of data centers. Global stocks sold off in November as worries of an AI-fueled bubble persisted.

But S&P Global reported that more than $61 billion has flowed into the data center market this year, up slightly from $60.8 billion last year, amid what it called a “global construction frenzy.”

A surge in debt financing contributed to the record high as hyperscalers increasingly tap private equity markets rather than funding the expensive infrastructure themselves.

That trend has sparked concerns from some investors as they question the value of the advanced tech that data centers house.

Shares of cloud company Oracle fell 5% on Wednesday following a report that Blue Owl Capital was pulling out of a deal to back a $10 billion data center in Michigan. Oracle has denied the report, but Broadcom

, Nvidia and Advanced Micro Devices retreated after it was published. The Nasdaq Composite lost 1.81% in its worst day in nearly a month.

Iuri Struta, TMT analyst at S&P Global Market Intelligence, said his team expects market concerns around AI and Oracle to be temporary and unlikely to have a “massive impact” on data center buildout and M&A in the near future.

“The competitive dynamic among frontier AI model providers, like OpenAI, Alphabet and Anthropic, is changing quickly, and this can have an impact on investor sentiment in public markets. But overall, we see demand for AI applications continuing to grow strongly in 2026.”

Despite the recent pullback in AI stocks, many analysts remain bullish on the sector. ING expects secular trends to point to healthy investment levels in 2026 driven by AI advancements and growing public and private support for digital innovation.

“There are two sides to the development of AI, one that would cater for optimism such as faster development of medicine and at the same time there would be concerns typically around (public) safety,” Wim Steenbakkers, global head of datacenters and technology at ING, told CNBC.

“Hence uncertainty remains around the monetisation of the technology and business models. Questions around the high levels of investment will only be answered in the future when the uncertainties diminish and the applications of the technology and its advantages become clearer.”

There were more than 100 data center transactions in the first 11 months of the year, whose total value already exceeds all the deals done in 2024, according to S&P Global Market Intelligence data. The majority of those deals took place in the U.S., followed by the Asia-Pacific region.

“In Europe, the buildout of data centers is expected to grow at a lower rate than other regions, but it remains to be seen if this results in an M&A rush amid scarcity of assets,” Struta said.

The pace of growth in the U.S. is leaving Europe “in the dust” according to a recent report from ING which predicted data center investment in the U.S. could be fivefold higher. Growth is also increasingly coming from the Middle East, as the wealthy Gulf States look to position themselves as the next global AI hub.

Debt issuance nearly doubles in 2025

Debt issuance nearly doubled to $182 billion in 2025, up from $92 billion last year, according to the data from S&P. It noted that Meta and Google were among the most active issuers, with Facebook’s owner raising $62 billion in debt since 2022 — nearly half of that total was issued in 2025 alone.

Google and Amazon

raised $29 billion and $15 billion, respectively, according to the report, which noted that hyperscalers are increasingly working with AI labs to buy assets to finance construction in an “unusual arrangement” that underscores the significant capital required to meet demand.

Struta expects more “robust” M&A investment activity in the data center space in 2026.

“I wouldn’t be surprised if already high valuations get even higher,” he told CNBC.

“The buildout of new data centers can be temporarily tempered by a lack of energy supply, making already built data centers more valuable. As the availability of large data center companies remains scarce, we could see more asset sales by companies that don’t view data centers as their core business.”