(Reuters) - Oracle expects to raise $45 billion to $50 billion in 2026 to build additional capacity for its cloud infrastructure, the software company said on Sunday.

Shares of Oracle fell 3.6% in overnight trading.

The company, chaired by billionaire Larry Ellison, said it plans to achieve its funding objectives using a combination of debt and equity financing.

"Oracle is raising money in order to build additional capacity to meet the contracted demand from our largest Oracle Cloud Infrastructure customers, including AMD, Meta, NVIDIA, OpenAI, TikTok, xAI and others", the company said in a statement.

Oracle plans to raise around half of the funding through a combination of equity-linked and common equity issuances, including mandatory convertible preferred securities and a new at-the-market equity program of up to $20 billion.

The software group plans to raise the other half of its funding by issuing senior unsecured bonds early in 2026.

Investors have scrutinized Oracle's AI infrastructure build-out in recent weeks as its debt climbs and its fortunes become increasingly tied to OpenAI, which is not profitable and has not detailed how it would finance its infrastructure plans.

Oracle was sued earlier this month by bondholders who say they suffered losses because the company concealed its need to sell significant additional debt to build out its artificial intelligence infrastructure.

The cost of insuring Oracle's debt against default surged in December last year to its highest in at least five years.