The artificial intelligence (AI) boom sweeping across the United States isn’t just a story about algorithms and cloud computing—it's rapidly reshaping the country’s economic landscape, fueling a surge in demand for raw materials, and sending ripples through global markets. At the heart of this transformation are data centers, the physical backbone of AI, whose construction and operation are igniting unprecedented demand for advanced semiconductors and essential metals like copper.
On May 15, 2026, Onsemi, a leading American power semiconductor manufacturer, closed at $113.11 per share. While that marked a 4.44% dip from the previous day, it’s hard to overstate the company’s meteoric rise: since the start of 2026, Onsemi’s stock has soared by 99.48%. According to Maeil Business Newspaper, this dramatic climb comes as Wall Street grows increasingly bullish on the company, thanks largely to the explosive growth of AI infrastructure investment.
AI data centers are not your run-of-the-mill server farms. They’re energy-hungry behemoths, requiring far more power than traditional facilities. Onsemi sits at the heart of this ecosystem, supplying the critical chips that convert electricity from power plants into the precise voltages needed by AI processors like Nvidia’s GPUs. As the paper puts it, Onsemi’s chips are “the heart and blood vessels” ensuring GPUs run efficiently and safely.
The company’s latest earnings report is a testament to its robust position. In the first quarter of 2026, Onsemi posted revenue of $1.5133 billion—a 4.5% year-over-year increase—beating market expectations of $1.49 billion. Earnings per share (EPS) reached $0.64, up more than 16% from the previous year and outpacing the anticipated $0.61. Notably, while electric vehicle demand has slowed, Onsemi’s AI data center segment revenue more than doubled compared to a year ago, emerging as a new engine of growth.
CEO Hassan El-Khoury highlighted this trend, stating, “AI data center business revenue grew over 30% quarter-over-quarter.” He expressed optimism for the future, adding, “We are encouraged by the long-term opportunities driven by increased semiconductor content in automotive and AI data center applications.” The company projects continued momentum, forecasting second quarter revenues between $1.535 billion and $1.635 billion, and EPS in the range of $0.65 to $0.77.
Wall Street has taken notice. In May 2026, Mizuho Securities raised Onsemi’s price target from $70 to $120, Evercore ISI bumped theirs from $80 to $121, and Susquehanna lifted its target from $100 to $120. It’s a clear signal that investors see Onsemi as a linchpin in the AI revolution.
But semiconductors are only one piece of the puzzle. The AI data center boom is also driving a scramble for copper—a metal essential for power cables, transformers, and circuit boards. According to Nikkei Asia and Newton, Amazon Web Services (AWS) inked a two-year deal on January 15, 2026, to buy copper directly from the Johnson Camp Mine (JCM) in Arizona. The mine, about 65 miles east of Tucson, resumed commercial production in late August 2025 after a remodel, and now boasts an annual capacity of roughly 25 million pounds (11,340 tons) of copper cathode at 99.999% purity.
What sets this arrangement apart is the use of bioleaching technology developed by Newton, a joint venture between Rio Tinto and Gunnison Copper. Since December 2025, Newton’s process uses bacteria to accelerate chemical reactions, extracting more copper from ore while slashing CO2 emissions by 50% and water use by 60%. Over the next four years, Newton plans to produce 30,000 tons of refined copper from JCM, with about 14,000 tons coming from bioleaching. AWS is the first customer to purchase this eco-friendly copper, which will be used in the very infrastructure powering Amazon’s AI ambitions.
Amazon’s appetite for copper is enormous. The company plans to spend $200 billion in capital expenditures in 2026 to meet surging AI demand, fueling a construction spree of new data centers. Each facility consumes tens of thousands of tons of copper, and the AWS-JCM contract is expected to cover only a portion of Amazon’s total needs. The broader market is feeling the squeeze: copper prices have recently surged past $13,000 per ton, up about 40% year-over-year, a spike closely tied to the U.S. data center construction boom.
Yet, expanding copper supply is no simple feat. Environmental regulations and complex approval processes mean opening a new mine in the U.S. can take up to 29 years, while in Chile—the world’s top copper producer—it can take 22 years. Recent shutdowns at major mines in Panama and Indonesia due to legal and safety issues have only tightened global supply. S&P Global projects that between 2025 and 2040, global copper demand will jump 50% to 42 million tons, potentially leaving a 10 million ton shortfall by 2040 if supply doesn’t keep pace.
This scramble for resources isn’t just a U.S. affair. According to Korea Economic Daily, Apollo Global Management’s Chief Economist Torsten Slok described the current AI-driven data center construction boom as a key driver of U.S. GDP growth in 2026, contributing about 1 percentage point—roughly half the typical 2% annual growth rate. In an interview on May 11, 2026, Slok emphasized that the benefits extend far beyond American borders. “The U.S. data center construction boom is making Korea a major beneficiary,” he said, noting that South Korea’s dominance in semiconductor manufacturing is fueling a rally in its stock market as global demand for data center components surges.
However, not all is rosy on the macroeconomic front. Slok cautioned that inflation remains a persistent concern. “According to market consensus, the Federal Reserve, and our own forecasts, inflation will stay close to 3% for the next 12 months and will only start to fall significantly by mid-2027,” he explained. This lingering inflation could pose challenges for both the tech sector and the broader economy, even as AI investments drive growth.
As the AI boom continues, it’s clear that the ripple effects are being felt in boardrooms, on trading floors, and deep in the earth where metals like copper are coaxed from rock. The intersection of cutting-edge technology and old-fashioned resource extraction is shaping a new industrial era—one where the future of AI is built not just on code, but on silicon and copper, sweat and ingenuity.
With AI’s relentless advance, companies like Onsemi and Amazon are both beneficiaries and drivers of this transformation. Their fortunes—and those of the global economy—now hinge on a complex web of innovation, investment, and resource management. The world is watching, and the stakes couldn’t be higher.