The projected capital expenditures of major tech companies for 2026 are truly eye-popping. Yet, an in-depth report from RBC indicates that the actual pace of growth might decelerate. It's anticipated that Amazon, Google, Meta, and Microsoft will pour close to $600 billion into fields like data centers and chip development to keep pace with the burgeoning AI requirements. However, the primary catalyst behind this surge is the escalating prices of memory. Data center memory expenses are forecasted to leap from $107 billion in 2025 to a staggering $237 billion in 2026, constituting 45% of the overall capital expenditure growth. A whopping nearly $98 billion of this increase is attributed to price hikes. Once memory costs are factored out, the capital expenditure growth rate is projected to plummet from 80% to 40%. RBC cautions that memory prices represent the most significant variable influencing capital expenditure trends in 2027.