By Deborah Mary Sophia

Feb 5 (Reuters) - The pressure is on Amazon.com to provide on lofty expectations for cloud computing in its fourth-quarter outcomes on Thursday, clashofcryptos.trade after Microsoft and Google's lackluster reports jolted financier faith in Big Tech's billion-dollar investments in AI.

Shares of significant tech companies surged in the past 2 years on the belief that massive datacenter needs for artificial-intelligence technologies would power investment for years.

But that was before Chinese start-up DeepSeek said it had actually attained AI developments at a fraction of the expense, precipitating a selloff in technology stocks that some say was past due.

Still, Amazon might be better than competitors to profit from cheaper AI, experts say, due to its enormous cloud business and lower direct exposure to expensive large-language models that power apps like ChatGPT.

Amazon Web Services, the world's largest cloud services company, is expected to post its greatest earnings increase in 8 quarters at 19.3%, thatswhathappened.wiki according to information assembled by LSEG.

But Microsoft and Meta were both required to safeguard their AI spending plans last week, and utahsyardsale.com shares of Google-parent Alphabet plunged 8% on Wednesday after it said it would be spending more on capex than analysts expected.

"Microsoft and Google results have put even more of a microscopic lense on Amazon's cloud growth," said Dave Wagner, portfolio manager at Aptus Capital Advisors, which holds shares in all 3 technology business.

"But if Amazon can crush it on their cloud numbers, the marketplace's going to absolutely love that report."

The company was the very first big cloud supplier to accept DeepSeek's AI models last month and has said its capital spending, mainly on AI, would be more than the $75 billion it estimated for 2024.

Slowing development at Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud, the 2nd- and third-biggest cloud players, has actually sparked some care from analysts about AWS' performance.

"Microsoft said it was capacity constrained, Google said it was capability constrained. More than likely, Amazon is going to say it might have been capacity constrained too and that's why its growth rate isn't quite approximately what the market might have anticipated," said Bob O'Donnell, systemcheck-wiki.de chief expert at TECHnalysis Research.

Some analysts see the weakness at rivals as an indication that Amazon might have caught up in the AI race through efforts including doubling its investment in Anthropic and offering a large selection of AI models on its cloud platform.

"We really think that AWS is regaining share. It had actually been growing a lot slower than Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud for a duration of time, however we believe that as Amazon has caught up on its AI offering, it might have less of a deceleration than Azure and Google Cloud," D.A. Davidson expert Gil Luria said.

The company has maintained a higher appraisal than some of its competitors, with a current forward price-to-earnings ratio of nearly 39. Microsoft's forward P/E is 29 and Alphabet's 22.4, addsub.wiki according to LSEG information.

RETAIL STRENGTH

The e-commerce giant's results are likewise most likely to gain from a healthy vacation shopping season, after rival retailers such as Target and a variety of garments companies released rosy forecasts over the past month.

Amazon's North American sales for fraternityofshadows.com the 4th quarter are predicted to rise 9% year-on-year. After a slowdown in online sales growth earlier this year, analysts state Amazon is primed for a rebound in the retail company, which has influenced its post-earnings share movements over the past two quarters.

Data from Adobe Analytics showed U.S. buyers spent lavishly online in between November and December 2024, investing more than $240 billion, drawn by deep discounts on everything from TVs to toys.

The vacation costs development rate of 8.7% practically doubled from the 4.9% tape-recorded in 2023, the data revealed.

Amazon has actually also attempted to improve shipment times and expanded product merchandise, including its concentrate on grocery, pharmacy and fashion - moves analysts say will help move growth.

"Most indications are that it was an excellent quarter. There was a great vacation season for the customer therefore there's plenty of factor to think Amazon will have done well because side of the service," Luria said.

(Reporting by Deborah Sophia in Bengaluru