Corning strikes another big AI deal. What the new Amazon pact means for the stock
Corning shares rose Monday after the company signed a major data center deal with Amazon; It was the latest in a series of high-profile wins for the Club conglomerate. Amazon has said it will pay billions of dollars to Corning for optical fiber in the coming years to support its growing data center footprint. The investment will allow Corning to expand production at its North Carolina manufacturing facilities and create 1,000 new jobs. Corning opened 8.4% on this news. The stock fell slightly but still closed up more than 5%. Investors welcomed the increase in optical communications, Corning’s largest reporting segment. The division’s revenue rose 36% year over year last quarter, as hyperscalers turned to Corning for fiber-optic cabling and networking solutions needed to build AI infrastructure and data centers. These hyperscalers include Meta Platforms, which announced a partnership with Corning in January. Meta said it will spend up to $6 billion by 2030 for these fiber optic cables in AI data centers. In late April, Corning also announced a supply agreement and $500 million investment with chipmaker Nvidia to bring more of its glass technology to data centers. “Can I tell you this is incredible?” Here’s what Jim Cramer said after the Nvidia deal last month. “This is a different Corning. There’s a real demand for it. The customers are real and they’re amazing.” During Corning’s April 28 earnings call, CEO Wendell Weeks shared that Meta has two other “very significant” deals with hyperscale customers. Details were light at the time, but Weeks told Jim Cramer a week later that each was worth more than Meta’s deal worth up to $6 billion. “It’s probably the biggest business deal of my career that we just entered into with Nvidia, and the other two big deals are bigger than the Meta deal that was made public, and I’m sure some of these customers will want to be more open about that over time,” Weeks said on “Mad Money” last month. It’s unclear whether Amazon is one of these two hyperscalers that Weeks mentioned. A Corning spokesperson told CNBC that the company’s “approach is to let our customers decide when and where to make announcements about supply chain decisions.” Amazon is “just one of many deals in our pipeline,” the spokesperson added. An Amazon spokesman declined to comment on the size of the deal. Even without confirmation, it’s still encouraging to see Corning form a third alliance with some of the world’s largest tech companies in just six months. Each deal will not only increase revenue but also reduce the risk of Corning expanding its capacity too much. Corning has been burned before by investing in capacity before revenue that never materialized. The company learned how the dotcom era worked during the boom and bust and adapted. These new long-term contracts with hyperscalers like Amazon ensure that demand is there before supply increases. In this way, Corning shares the risk with its partner companies. Monday’s rally in Corning helped stocks get back on track after a recent decline. The stock has more than doubled year to date, compared to the S&P 500’s gain of just over 8% in 2026. Last week, we sold some after a big rally. Corning took action after Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang talked about the importance of optics in data center construction during the important Computex conference. It is important for investors not to get greedy when a position goes up. This is prudent portfolio management. We gained approximately 133% from the shares purchased in October. GLW YTD mountain Corning YTD We don’t do the same on Monday. We sold it on June 2 for approximately $200 per share; There’s no reason to go down to around $187. “That was a good sell,” Jim said during Monday’s Morning Meeting. “This makes me feel like we have it. Remember, one sale immunizes you.” Taking partial profits can protect against what happens next in the market, which collapsed on Friday and rebounded on Monday. Last week’s Corning embellishment was not due to a change in our thesis. On the contrary, we remain more bullish on Corning. These partnerships are a textbook example of why we start a position. Corning is an unlikely winner of the AI boom. The crucial optical communications segment offers a more efficient alternative in fiber to the slower copper connections found in data centers. This presents yet another long-term catalyst for the stock. “When you think of fiber, you should think of Corning,” Jim said at our May Monthly Meeting. He added that Corning also “makes the glass for everything from the cover of your Apple phone to the windshield of the new electric Ferrari.” That’s another reason we love the stock; Manufacturing partnership with Apple owner Club for device displays. “This is a magnificent, valuable American icon and a tremendous stock,” Jim said. “[Corning] continues to be discovered again and again by the analyst community.” (Jim Cramer’s Charitable Trust is long GLW, AMZN, META, NVDA, AAPL. See here for a full list of stocks.) When you subscribe to the CNBC Investment Club with Jim Cramer, you receive a trade alert before Jim makes a trade. Jim waits 45 minutes after sending a trade alert before buying or selling a stock in his charitable trust’s portfolio. 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