A striking statistic today: Nvidia ($NVDA), Micron ($MU), Broadcom ($AVGO), and Applied Materials ($AMAT) are now projected to generate a combined $430 billion in free cash flow (FCF) over the next 12 months. This is more than triple the FCF they generated just two years ago. Meanwhile, the combined FCF of Amazon ($AMZN), Alphabet ($GOOGL), Meta ($META), Microsoft ($MSFT), and Oracle ($ORCL) is projected to turn negative for the first time on record. That would mark a massive reversal from the peak of over $260 billion reported by these companies in 2024. This shift coincides with estimates that AI-related capital expenditure (CapEx) by these five companies will surge to a combined total of approximately $1.8 trillion across 2026 and 2027. Chipmakers are turning into cash-generating machines, while AI giants are burning through record amounts of capital.