Blog

Investment Heroes 2020

By: Michael Mandel / Elliott Long / 07.24.2020

This post has been updated to include additional data, as well as updating our original preliminary estimate of Microsoft’s capital expenditures to reflect their since-released 10-K report.

Given the ongoing pandemic, capital investment is more important than ever before. Hundreds of billions of dollars of investment by broadband providers enabled the U.S. Internet to respond magnificently to soaring demand when the pandemic hit. On the other hand, some of the sectors that have struggled the most—such as medical equipment and supplies and food production and processing—have suffered from a shortfall of investment.

To emphasize the importance of capital spending for wages and growth, each year the Progressive Policy Institute publishes our list of U.S. “Investment Heroes:” the companies who are investing the most in America. Currently, accounting rules do not require companies to report their U.S. capital spending separately. To fill this gap in the data, we created a methodology using publicly-available financial statements from non-financial Fortune 150 companies to identify the top companies that were investing in the United States.

Table 1 below provides the top 25 non-financial companies, ranked by U.S. capital expenditure in the latest fiscal year through June 30, 2020. Table 2 below provides the top 25 nonfinancial non-energy companies, ranked by U.S. capital expenditure in the latest fiscal year through June 30, 2020 (Our methodology is described in last year’s report. In particular, page 15 of that report describes adjustments made for particular companies). 

We note that 10 out of the top 11 companies in Table 2 are either broadband providers or tech/ecommerce companies. Out of those ten, the broadband providers invested $52 billion in the United States in their most recent fiscal year, while the tech/ecommerce companies invested $84 billion.

Table 1. U.S. Investment Heroes: Top 25 Nonfinancial Companies by Estimated U.S. Capital Expenditure
Rank Company ESTIMATED 2019 U.S. CAPITAL EXPENDITURES (Millions USD)*
1 Amazon.com $19,306
2 AT&T $18,520
3 Alphabet $18,037
4 Exxon Mobil $16,580
5 Verizon Communications $16,058
6 Intel $13,416
7 Facebook $12,457
8 Duke Energy $11,122
9 Microsoft $11,073**
10 Comcast $10,467
11 Chevron $10,062
12 Apple $9,772
13 Walmart $7,904
14 Southern $7,880
15 Exelon $7,248
16 Charter Communications $7,195
17 Ford Motor $6,414
18 Energy Transfer $5,960
19 Marathon Petroleum $5,374
20 Delta Air Lines $4,936
21 ConocoPhillips $4,907
22 General Motors $4,899
23 United Parcel Service $4,793
24 FedEx $4,647
25 Enterprise Products Partners $4,532
Top 25 Total $243,560
*Based on most recent fiscal year as of June 30, 3030
**Originally estimated based on 7/22/20 earnings report. 

Revised estimate based on 2020 10-K report

Data: Company financial reports, PPI estimates

 

 

 

Table 2. Non-energy U.S. Investment Heroes: Top 25 Nonfinancial Companies by Estimated U.S. Capital Expenditure
Rank COMPANY ESTIMATED 2019 U.S. CAPITAL EXPENDITURES (Millions USD)*
1 Amazon.com $19,306
2 AT&T $18,520
3 Alphabet $18,037
4 Verizon Communications $16,058
5 Intel $13,416
6 Facebook $12,457
7 Microsoft $11,073**
8 Comcast $10,467
9 Apple $9,772
10 Walmart $7,904
11 Charter Communications $7,195
12 Ford Motor $6,414
13 Delta Air Lines $4,936
14 General Motors $4,899
15 United Parcel Service $4,793
16 FedEx $4,647
17 United Continental Holdings $4,528
18 American Airlines Group $4,268
19 Walt Disney $4,024
20 CenturyLink $3,628
21 HCA Healthcare $3,537
22 Union Pacific $3,453
23 Kroger $3,128
24 Target $3,027
25 CVS Health $2,457
Top 25 Total $201,945**
*Based on most recent fiscal year as of June 30, 3030
**Originally estimated based on 7/22/20 earnings report. 

Revised estimate based on 2020 10-K report

Data: Company financial reports, PPI estimates

 

(Analysis by Elliott Long and Michael Mandel).