US futures steady as investors await Oracle’s AI spending results

US stock futures opened mostly flat on September 10, with the S&P 500 and Nasdaq both drifting slightly lower as investors braced for two catalysts arriving in quick succession: fresh producer price index inflation data and Oracle’s quarterly earnings report. Oil prices have spiked above $100 per barrel, driven by escalating geopolitical tensions in the Middle East involving Iran and Saudi Arabia.

Oracle’s fiscal Q4 2026 capital expenditures clocked in at $55.7 billion, blowing past its own $50 billion forecast, focused on expanding AI-centric data centers.

Oracle’s cloud numbers tell a compelling story

Oracle’s cloud infrastructure revenue surged 93% year-over-year in Q4 FY2026, reaching $5.8 billion. Total cloud revenue, which includes software-as-a-service alongside infrastructure, climbed 47% to $9.9 billion.

The remaining performance obligations backlog hit a record $638 billion. RPO is essentially the total value of contracts Oracle has locked in but hasn’t yet recognized as revenue.

Investors watching the upcoming Q1 FY2027 report, expected after market close, want to see whether that trajectory holds.

Macro headwinds complicate the picture

The PPI data due later in the session will offer the latest read on wholesale price pressures. The Federal Reserve delivered a rate cut the day before, intended to ease financial conditions. Rate cuts typically boost risk assets by lowering the cost of capital and making future corporate earnings more valuable in present terms. But cutting rates while oil is surging creates a tension: lower rates encourage borrowing and spending, while higher energy costs eat into margins and purchasing power.

What Oracle’s results mean for the broader AI trade

Oracle’s cloud infrastructure business serves the companies actually building and deploying AI models at scale. Oracle’s $55.7 billion in capital expenditures puts it among companies spending aggressively on physical infrastructure during a period of economic uncertainty. Oracle’s 93% cloud infrastructure growth suggests the payoff is materializing. Traders should also consider the interaction between Oracle’s results and the macro data. A hot PPI print combined with strong Oracle earnings could create a split-screen market: tech rallying on AI optimism while broader indices wobble on inflation fears.

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