Alphabet, Amazon, Meta, and Microsoft beat first-quarter earnings expectations, but investors scrutinize heavy AI spending

Alphabet, Amazon, Meta, and Microsoft all beat first-quarter earnings expectations on Wednesday. Meta's stock fell in after-hours trading after it announced plans to put more capital toward AI.

The other three Big Tech firms reported strong cloud computing growth. Investors are poised to closely scrutinize the companies' heavy spending on AI.

A report this week on OpenAI's missed revenue and user targets added to investor jitters about whether Big Tech can justify its sky-high expenditures on AI.