💼 AWS CFO Joked That AI Pushed Amazon Into Negative Cash Flow

Business Insider published a recording of an internal AWS meeting where CFO John Felt joked that AI investments have made Amazon negative in free cash flow: the company is spending $220 billion in 2026 on data centers, and the head of AI infrastructure confirmed that the ML/AI business will remain "massively negative" for another couple of years.

Compiled by Sergey KostenchukPublished 2026-10-20Updated 2026-10-20

2026-10-20 Business Google

💼 AWS CFO Joked That AI Pushed Amazon Into Negative Cash Flow

Business Insider obtained a recording of a September AWS meeting: CFO John Felt joked to AI infrastructure head Prasad Kalyanaraman that he had "made our company negative in free cash flow." With $220 billion a year on data centers, Amazon is in the red on free cash flow for the first time in years, and Kalyanaraman confirmed: the "massively negative" ML/AI business will remain so for another couple of years.

🌍 The bottleneck has shifted from chips to electricity, construction, and workers: Amazon is developing 44 GW of data centers — more than Google, Meta, and Microsoft.

👤 Scaling has become routine: since August, Amazon has been receiving racks of Nvidia GB300s worth ~$5 billion a month and building housing for electricians in Texas. AWS growth of 37% does not save it from the deficit.

Source 1: https://www.businessinsider.com/amazon-220-billion-ai-bet-data-centers-spending-challenges-2026-10 Source 2: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50161130

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