Benzinga - by Anusuya Lahiri, Benzinga Editor.
Amazon.com Inc (NASDAQ:AMZN) committed $1.4 billion to its Housing Equity Fund, enhancing affordable housing in Seattle, Nashville, and Washington metro areas.
The funds will create 14,000 affordable units in these locations, raising Amazon’s total housing pledge to $3.6 billion, Bloomberg cites Amazon blog post on Tuesday.
In 2021, Amazon earmarked $2 billion for low-interest loans and grants, joining other tech companies in making housing more affordable, especially in expensive West Coast cities.
Also Read: Amazon Boosts Prime Benefits With Grubhub Partnership, Takes Aim At Walmart
Critics had accused Amazon and other tech giants, including Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:GOOG) (NASDAQ:GOOGL), Apple Inc (NASDAQ:AAPL), Meta Platforms Inc (NASDAQ:META), and Microsoft Corp (NASDAQ:MSFT), of worsening regional housing shortages by bringing in highly paid engineers.
Amazon targets units for families earning 30% to 80% of each area’s median income, aiming to help those who don’t qualify for existing subsidies and can’t afford rising housing costs.
On a separate note, Amazon earmarked billions of dollars in Taiwan over the next 15 years to establish data centers to fulfill Asia’s increasing demand for cloud services.
Amazon proposes to launch an Amazon Web Services infrastructure region in Taiwan by 2025.
Analysts maintained their conviction in Amazon’s generative AI moat, claiming the company to be one of the two to three winners of GenAI.
Amazon stock gained 48% in the last 12 months. Investors can gain exposure to the stock via Fidelity MSCI Consumer Discretionary Index ETF (NYSE:FDIS) and VanEck Retail ETF (NASDAQ:RTH).
Price Action: AMZN shares traded lower by 0.02% at $187.20 premarket at the last check on Wednesday.
Disclaimer: This content was partially produced with the help of AI tools and was reviewed and published by Benzinga editors.
Photo by Cascade Creatives on Shutterstock
© 2024 Benzinga.com. Benzinga does not provide investment advice. All rights reserved.