Oracle Bets Up to $90 Billion on AI Despite Cloud Growth Slowdown

*Editor's Note: 'AI PRISM' (Personalized Report & Insight Summarizing Media) is an "artificial intelligence (AI)-based customized news recommendation and summary service" developed with support from the Korea Press Foundation. It selects and provides six customized news items by reader type.

1. Oracle Revenue Jumps 21%, But AI Infrastructure Investment Burden Rises

- Key Summary: Oracle's fourth-quarter revenue for fiscal 2026 (March–May) was $19.2 billion, up 21% from the same period a year earlier, and adjusted earnings per share (EPS) rose 24% to $2.11. However, cloud revenue of $9.91 billion came in slightly below the market expectation of $9.97 billion, and its growth rate of 47% fell short of the market's projected 48%. Oracle presented capital expenditure guidance of $90 billion to $95 billion for fiscal 2027, far exceeding the market consensus of $69 billion and raising concerns over short-term profitability pressure. On the other hand, remaining performance obligations (RPO, the scale of contracts to be recognized as future revenue) surged 363% from a year earlier to $638 billion, demonstrating the solid demand for cloud infrastructure.

2. Meta, a Signal of Overinvestment and Slowing Chip Demand? "No Change in the AI Cycle"

- Key Summary: Semiconductor stocks plunged in tandem after Meta signaled a possible entry into the cloud market, but experts read this not as a contraction in AI demand but as a signal that Big Tech is shifting its GPU investment recovery approach from "purchase scale" to "utilization efficiency." Meta is the only one of the four major hyperscalers (large cloud operators) without a cloud business, leaving advertising as its sole channel for recovering AI investment costs, and leasing surplus computing resources externally is an option to offset those investment costs. The GPUs Meta is considering leasing center on older generations such as the A100 and H100, while investment in the latest Blackwell chips continues, so the prevailing analysis is that this is a matter of capital efficiency. Meanwhile, the commodification of computing resources is gaining momentum, with CME Group announcing it will launch the world's first "compute futures" (futures trading of GPU computing resources) within this year.

3. Amid China's Tungsten Blockade, the U.S. Awakens a Korean Mine Dormant for 32 Years

- Key Summary: Almonty Industries, a U.S. tungsten specialist, resumed mining at the Sangdong mine in Yeongwol, Gangwon Province, in March this year for the first time in 32 years. The Sangdong mine holds 58 million tons of tungsten, the largest reserves of any single mine in the world, and 2,100 tons of its annual production of 2,600 tons are exported to the United States, with plans to expand to a 4,600-ton annual production system in the future. Tungsten is a strategic mineral essential to semiconductors, defense, and advanced industries, and its price surged after China, which accounts for 85% of global production, imposed sweeping export controls last year. Meanwhile, China has effectively halted tungsten exports amid deteriorating relations with Japan, and Japan's NHK and the United States' New York Times (NYT) have reported successively on the strategic significance of the Sangdong mine's reopening.

4. "Companions in Misfortune" Korea and Japan Struggle to Contain Exchange Rates

- Key Summary: After the won-dollar exchange rate hit 1,555.8 won on the 2nd, once again setting a fresh high since March 2009, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Economy and Finance Koo Yun-cheol made public remarks, saying he "will do his utmost to stabilize the foreign exchange market." Foreign investors net sold more than 4 trillion won on the KOSPI that day, extending their selling streak to 10 consecutive trading days, and this outflow acted as a factor once again strengthening the won's weakness. Meanwhile, the yen-dollar exchange rate plunged during afternoon trading and the yen suddenly turned stronger, with the market presuming that Japanese authorities had intervened in the foreign exchange market to defend the value of the yen, which had shown its lowest level in 40 years. Due to the synchronization of the won and yen, the won-dollar exchange rate fell to 1,548 won in overnight trading.

5. Local Administration Officials Benefit Association Forms 387.8 Billion Won European Real Estate SMA Through U.S. Firm Nuveen

- Key Summary: The Korea Local Administration Officials Benefit Association entrusted funds to Nuveen Real Estate, a real estate investment management firm under the U.S. Teachers Insurance and Annuity Association (TIAA), to form a separately managed account (SMA) worth 220 million euros (about 387.8 billion won). Mirae Asset Global Investments participates as a co-investor and domestic asset manager, while Nuveen Real Estate handles core-plus (an investment strategy that adds some value-creation elements to prime, high-quality assets) real estate equity investments across Europe. The first investment target is "Bravo!", a private purpose-built student accommodation (PBSA) portfolio with a total of 3,323 beds located in seven Spanish university cities, which Nuveen described as Europe's largest private student accommodation deal this year. Nuveen Real Estate is a global real estate investment institution with about $136 billion in assets under management (AUM) as of March 2025.

6. Samsung Electro-Mechanics (009150) and Sumitomo Chemical Establish Glass Substrate Joint Venture 'GlaSSEM,' Targeting Mass Production in 2027

- Key Summary: Samsung Electro-Mechanics signed an agreement to establish 'GlaSSEM,' a joint venture with Dongwoo Fine-Chem, a subsidiary of Japan's Sumitomo Chemical Group, to produce 'glass core,' a key material for glass substrates. Of the total investment of about 482.1 billion won, Samsung Electro-Mechanics injected 319.1 billion won to secure a 66% stake, and the production base will be established within Dongwoo Fine-Chem's Pyeongtaek plant in Pyeongtaek, Gyeonggi Province. Glass substrates have a lower thermal expansion rate and superior flatness than conventional plastic and other organic material substrates, making them suitable for implementing large-area, high-density semiconductor packages for AI servers, and are regarded as a "game changer" in the next-generation packaging market. GlaSSEM plans to supply samples to global Big Tech firms within this year and begin mass production in the second half of 2027.