{"id":71053,"date":"2026-08-28T11:38:12","date_gmt":"2026-08-28T15:38:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www2.stockmarketwatch.com\/stock-market-news\/amazon-surges-4-2-as-ecb-official-signals-september-rate-hike\/71053\/"},"modified":"2026-08-28T11:38:12","modified_gmt":"2026-08-28T15:38:12","slug":"amazon-surges-4-2-as-ecb-official-signals-september-rate-hike","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www2.stockmarketwatch.com\/stock-market-news\/amazon-surges-4-2-as-ecb-official-signals-september-rate-hike\/71053\/","title":{"rendered":"Amazon Surges 4.2% as ECB Official Signals September Rate Hike"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2>Key Takeaways<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Amazon (<a href=\"\/stock\/AMZN\">AMZN<\/a>) shares surged 4.2%<\/strong>, leading gains among the &quot;Magnificent Seven&quot; mega-cap tech stocks as investors reacted to accelerating cloud growth and AI infrastructure demand.<\/li>\n<li><strong>ECB Governing Council member Bo\u0161tjan Dolenc<\/strong> stated that a rate increase in September is well-founded, citing persistent inflation that is &quot;not getting better.&quot;<\/li>\n<li><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/stockmarketwatch.com\/stock\/MSFT\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"18\" title=\"Stock: MSFT\">Microsoft<\/a> (<a href=\"\/stock\/MSFT\">MSFT<\/a>) and <a href=\"https:\/\/stockmarketwatch.com\/stock\/AMD\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"16\" title=\"stock: AMD\">AMD<\/a> (<a href=\"\/stock\/AMD\">AMD<\/a>)<\/strong> have expanded their strategic partnership, with <a href=\"https:\/\/stockmarketwatch.com\/stock\/MSFT\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"18\" title=\"Stock: MSFT\">Microsoft<\/a> set to deploy next-generation <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/stockmarketwatch.com\/stock\/AMD\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"16\" title=\"stock: AMD\">AMD<\/a> Helios<\/strong> AI processors to power frontier model inference on its Azure platform.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Eurozone inflation risks<\/strong> remain tilted to the upside, with Dolenc warning that policymakers should not delay action while waiting for second-round effects to manifest.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Market projections<\/strong> suggest the ECB may raise its deposit rate to <strong>2.50%<\/strong> in September to combat energy-driven price pressures stemming from ongoing Middle East conflicts.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2>Amazon Leads Tech Rally Amid AI Optimism<\/h2>\n<p>Amazon (<a href=\"\/stock\/AMZN\">AMZN<\/a>) saw its stock price climb <strong>4.2%<\/strong> on Friday, outperforming its mega-cap peers in the &quot;Magnificent Seven&quot; group. The rally follows recent data showing that <strong>Amazon Web Services (AWS)<\/strong> revenue accelerated to <strong>$42.2 billion<\/strong>, its fastest growth in 18 quarters, as the company scales its AI infrastructure to meet &quot;insatiable&quot; demand.<\/p>\n<p>Investors are increasingly confident in Amazon&#39;s ability to generate meaningful returns from its massive capital expenditure cycle. The company expects to spend approximately <strong>$220 billion<\/strong> on data centers and computing equipment through 2026, with CEO Andy Jassy noting that current capacity is still insufficient to meet the surge in AI-driven workloads.<\/p>\n<h2>ECB Official Hardens Hawkish Stance<\/h2>\n<p>European Central Bank (ECB) policymaker <strong>Bo\u0161tjan Dolenc<\/strong> delivered a series of hawkish remarks on Friday, asserting that there are clear reasons to support a <strong>rate increase in September<\/strong>. Dolenc emphasized that inflation is not showing signs of improvement and cautioned against waiting for second-round effects\u2014such as wage-price spirals\u2014to become visible before tightening policy further.<\/p>\n<p>Dolenc also noted that <strong>increasing bond yields<\/strong> may provide some benefits to the financial system&#39;s stability, though he looked toward the <strong>December projections<\/strong> to provide ultimate clarity on the long-term policy path. Current market pricing suggests a high probability of a <strong>25-basis-point hike<\/strong> at the ECB&#39;s September 10 meeting, which would bring the deposit facility rate to <strong>2.50%<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<h2>Microsoft and AMD Deepen AI Integration<\/h2>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/stockmarketwatch.com\/stock\/MSFT\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"18\" title=\"Stock: MSFT\">Microsoft<\/a> (<a href=\"\/stock\/MSFT\">MSFT<\/a>) is significantly expanding its use of Advanced Micro Devices (<a href=\"\/stock\/AMD\">AMD<\/a>) hardware to bolster its <strong>Azure AI<\/strong> infrastructure. The collaboration centers on the deployment of the <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/stockmarketwatch.com\/stock\/AMD\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"16\" title=\"stock: AMD\">AMD<\/a> Helios<\/strong> rack-scale solution, which integrates <strong>Instinct MI455X GPUs<\/strong> and <strong>6th Gen EPYC &quot;Venice&quot; CPUs<\/strong> to handle complex AI inference and training tasks.<\/p>\n<p>This partnership aims to provide Azure customers with more diverse hardware options for running large language models and &quot;agentic&quot; AI workloads. The move is seen as a strategic effort by Microsoft to reduce its reliance on a single chip supplier while helping <a href=\"https:\/\/stockmarketwatch.com\/stock\/AMD\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"16\" title=\"stock: AMD\">AMD<\/a> capture a larger share of the lucrative data center market currently dominated by <a href=\"https:\/\/stockmarketwatch.com\/stock\/NVDA\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"15\" title=\"stock: NVDA\">Nvidia<\/a> (<a href=\"\/stock\/NVDA\">NVDA<\/a>).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Key Takeaways Amazon (AMZN) shares surged 4.2%, leading gains among the &quot;Magnificent Seven&quot; mega-cap tech stocks as investors reacted to 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