Amazon and Alphabet power AI cloud rally as AWS Q2 crushes estimates, Nasdaq up 1%

Amazon.com Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN) surged 15.3% Friday after its second-quarter results showed Amazon Web Services revenue up 37% year over year to $42.2 billion, lifting the entire hyperscaler complex and pushing top AI stocks to their best single-session gain in months. The Nasdaq Composite rose 1.0% to 25,374 and the S&P 500 added 0.7% to 7,490, capping a volatile July on a bullish note. The SOXX semiconductor ETF was essentially flat at +0.07%, a split tape: cloud infrastructure won the day while memory and AI-adjacent chips lagged.

Top AI stocks today: July 31, 2026

Amazon surges 15% as AWS revenue rockets 37% past estimates

Amazon Web Services delivered $42.2 billion in Q2 revenue, up 37% year over year against analyst consensus of $40.5 billion, per CNBC. Adjusted EPS came in at $1.97 versus the $1.82 estimate, while total revenue of $200.6 billion grew 19.6% year over year. The beat validated a thesis that had faced pressure all year: that AI inference demand, not just model training, is translating into durable hyperscaler revenue growth. CEO Andy Jassy said the company expects capital spending to reach $220 billion in 2026, the largest single-year AI infrastructure commitment from any company on record. GAAP EPS was $5.75, boosted by a non-operating $53.4 billion gain from the company's stake in Anthropic.

The reaction across Magnificent 7 AI stocks was immediate. Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) gained 3.0%, Meta Platforms Inc. (NASDAQ: META) rose 3.3%, and NVIDIA Corp. (NASDAQ: NVDA) added 2.9%. The read-through is direct: if AWS demand is accelerating to 37% growth, the GPU clusters and AI infrastructure that run it are under-supplied, not over-supplied. Across more than 6,100 AI-native companies StartupHub.ai tracks globally, cloud infrastructure and AI tooling are the two most densely populated verticals, which is why a single AWS quarter can reprice the sector. These are the best AI stocks to buy when the demand signal is this clear, but they also carry the most downside if capex commitments outrun actual workload growth.

Alphabet climbs 6.7% as cloud confidence builds on AWS read-through

Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOGL) gained 6.7% as investors revisited the company's own Q2 results, released July 22, in light of Amazon's blowout. Google Cloud grew 82% in Q2 to $24.8 billion, consolidated revenue hit $119.8 billion, up 24% year over year, and operating income rose 30%, per the company's SEC filing. Friday's move reflects a market repricing: the prevailing concern heading into earnings season was that AI capital spending would outrun monetization. Amazon's AWS print and Google Cloud's 82% growth together suggest that concern is easing. GOOGL is up 13.0% year to date and is one of the top 2026 AI stocks to watch for enterprises betting on multi-cloud AI deployments.

Ouster jumps 9.8% on lidar analyst upgrades and capital raise momentum

Ouster Inc. (NASDAQ: OUST) rose 9.8% Friday, continuing a recovery backed by multiple analyst upgrades. Northland raised its price target to $60 from $38 on July 21, and Oppenheimer lifted its target to $57 from $42 on July 15, per Gurufocus. OUST closed at $39.01, meaning both targets imply 46 to 54% upside from current levels. The company completed a $191.9 million equity offering in early July at $55.22 per share. The AI autonomy and lidar theme benefited from the broader AI stocks rally today, with Ouster positioned as infrastructure for robotics and autonomous vehicle sensing. OUST is one of the more speculative AI stocks to watch if autonomy deployment timelines accelerate into 2027.

Notable but quieter

Micron Technology Inc. (NASDAQ: MU) fell 5.9%, the sharpest single-day drop in the tracked AI stocks universe and a reminder that the memory cycle runs on a separate clock from inference demand; MU is still up 160.9% year to date despite today's pullback. CoreWeave Inc. (NASDAQ: CRWV) slipped 2.9%, continuing its difficult July; the AI infrastructure pure play is down 12.2% over 30 days even as the broader cloud sector rallied sharply. Alibaba Group (NYSE: BABA) advanced 5.1%, gaining on the global cloud and AI sentiment wave; the stock has risen 27.2% over the past month as China AI investment narratives stabilize. MongoDB Inc. (NASDAQ: MDB) rose 3.6%, catching a cloud-tech bid on heavy volume; the company is down 15.6% year to date, leaving it at a meaningful discount to 2025 highs for investors looking at AI data-infrastructure names.

What are the top AI stocks to buy in July 2026?

Across hardware, hyperscale cloud, and enterprise SaaS, the consensus top AI stocks in July 2026 include NVIDIA Corp. (NVDA), Broadcom Inc. (AVGO), and Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (AMD) on the hardware side; Amazon (AMZN) for hyperscale AI infrastructure; and Oracle Corp. (ORCL) for enterprise AI software. Wall Street's 2026 focus has shifted from training-cluster buildout to inference and AI-agent monetization, which is reshuffling which names lead each session. The best AI stocks to buy in July 2026 depend on whether you believe the hyperscaler capex cycle translates to margin expansion, or whether competition compresses cloud unit economics. Top 2026 AI stocks to watch for this transition include AMZN, GOOGL, and NVDA, the three names most directly exposed to inference revenue growth.

AI stocks to watch: what comes next

NVIDIA Corp. (NASDAQ: NVDA) reports on August 26, 2026 - the next pivotal data point for AI chip stocks and the best AI infrastructure stocks heading into fall. Analysts expect the company to guide above $91 billion in quarterly revenue. If NVDA's data center segment confirms the demand signal Amazon sent tonight, the current AI chip stock rally could extend significantly. No major AI or tech earnings are on the calendar for the first week of August, giving the sector a consolidation window before the NVDA print resets expectations for AI stocks today and into Q3.

Core watchlist

Chips

Nvidia (NVDA): +2.93% on very heavy volume (139M shares). AWS read-through validated GPU inference demand; next catalyst is the Aug 26 earnings print, with $91B revenue guidance on the line.

AMD (AMD): -1.90% on average volume. Lagged the cloud rally as memory-cycle uncertainty weighed; watching for any competitive positioning data vs. NVDA ahead of the Q3 print.

Broadcom (AVGO): +0.37% on average volume. Quiet session; custom ASIC AI chip business remains the multi-quarter thesis. Up 8% over the past month, the steadier compounder in the chip group.

Taiwan Semiconductor (TSM): +0.23% on light volume. Flat but underpins the entire AI chip supply chain; 3-nanometer demand from Apple and NVDA remains the long-cycle anchor.

Hyperscalers

Microsoft (MSFT): +3.02% on heavy volume. Direct Azure read-through on the AMZN AWS beat; MSFT is up 19% over the past month, the strongest 30-day run in the Mag 7 AI stocks cohort.

Alphabet (GOOGL): Covered above. +6.73%, best single-day gain in weeks on renewed cloud confidence.

Meta (META): +3.28% on average volume. Riding the Magnificent 7 AI stocks wave; Llama model monetization and AI ad targeting are the longer-term catalysts to watch into H2 2026.

Amazon (AMZN): Covered above. +15.32%, the session's headline mover on Q2 earnings.

Enterprise SaaS

Oracle (ORCL): +1.81% on heavy volume. Cloud infrastructure bookings are the thesis; ORCL is down 33.6% year to date, making it one of the more contrarian plays in the AI infrastructure stocks space right now.

Salesforce (CRM): +1.83% on average volume. Agentforce AI monetization is the entire thesis; next major catalyst is any analyst day guidance on agent attach rates and enterprise upsell trajectory.

ServiceNow (NOW): +1.05% on very heavy volume. Workflow AI-agent rollout the carrier story; stock is down 24.6% year to date despite consistent enterprise AI adoption data from customers.

monday.com (MNDY): -1.15% on light volume. mondayAI suite expansion is the multi-quarter narrative; stock remains down 39.2% year to date, the most depressed name in the enterprise SaaS cohort.

Vol / retail

Palantir (PLTR): +0.65% on average volume. Quiet session; US government AI contract pipeline and AIP commercial expansion remain the thesis. Down 26.7% year to date.

Tesla (TSLA): +0.76% on light volume. Quiet follow-through; Full Self-Driving and optimus robotics remain the AI-adjacent thesis. Down 29.0% year to date.

Snowflake (SNOW): -1.62% on average volume. Data cloud platform pulled back despite up 12.7% over the past month on AI-data workload momentum; watching the next earnings print for signs of workload acceleration.

Not investment advice.