MENLO PARK, CALIFORNIA / RankWire.AI / – Meta plans to raise about US$95 billion by selling new shares, using the money to expand its artificial intelligence infrastructure and pursue superintelligence. The company announced the plan on Monday. It will start with $35 billion in underwritten public equity offerings and follow with a $60 billion at-the-market program. Chipmakers Nvidia, Advanced Micro Devices and Broadcom have signalled interest in buying up to $5 billion of the shares. Meta’s stock slipped 1.6% in morning trading.
The first tranche combines $22.5 billion of Class A common stock with $12.5 billion of mandatory convertible preferred depositary shares. The Class A shares will be sold through forward sale agreements that settle by November 19, 2027. The preferred shares are due to trade on Nasdaq as METAM and convert into common stock around August 15, 2029. Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs are running the offerings. The at-the-market sales, using new Class C shares, are planned for early 2027.
Meta said the funding will back emerging AI opportunities across its family of apps, its Muse AI agent and its data centre business. It intends to pay for the build-out with operating cash flow, investment-grade debt, partnerships and equity. The company is constructing four superclusters, each with capacity above 1 gigawatt. It expects to nearly double its total infrastructure capacity in 2026 from the previous year. Semafor reported that the sale is Meta’s first new stock issuance since 2013.
Spending outlook weighs on cash flow
Last week, Meta reported third-quarter revenue of $64.60 billion, a 26% rise from a year earlier. The result beat analyst expectations of $63.37 billion. Investors, however, concentrated on negative free cash flow of about $2.1 billion and rising spending. Capital expenditures for the quarter totalled about $34.9 billion. The company also lifted its full-year capex forecast to between $135 billion and $145 billion, up from a low end of $130 billion.
The shares fell on Thursday after the results and the higher spending outlook. Meta is one of several hyperscalers turning to debt and equity markets to finance the costly infrastructure needed for AI. Goldman Sachs estimates AI-related capital spending could reach about $7.6 trillion between 2026 and 2031 across compute, data centres and power. The scale of that spending has fuelled debate over whether the AI sector is a bubble or a breakthrough.
AI fundraising wave spreads across the sector
Ben Wood, senior partner at CCS Insight, told CNBC the move shows the extraordinary level of investment required in the AI arms race. He noted that Google, SpaceX and soon Anthropic are also raising funds in the markets. Alphabet said in June it planned to raise $85 billion. SpaceX has completed a $40 billion debt financing to purchase graphics processing units, the chips that power AI models.
Anthropic is preparing for an initial public offering. TikTok U.S. is seeking multiple gigawatts of computing capacity over the coming years, CNBC reported on Friday. The chipmakers’ interest in Meta shares has not been described as a binding commitment. Meta has not yet set out the pricing or pace of the $60 billion at-the-market program. The company said the equity raise forms one part of a broader funding mix for its AI plans.