Feb 19 (Reuters) - Meta META.O reduced its annual distribution of stock options by about 5% for most of its staff, as CEO Mark Zuckerberg ploughs billions of dollars into its artificial intelligence goals, the Financial Times reported on Thursday.

The Facebook parent did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Reuters could not independently verify the report.

Meta and other Big Tech companies are competing to outbuild each other with massive data centers to get ahead in Silicon Valley's heated AI race.

The social media company said in January that it expected capital expenditure for 2026 to be between $115 billion and $135 billion.

Meta has slashed equity-based awards for the bulk of its employees for the second year in a row, the report said, citing people familiar with the matter.

Last year, the company had cut the stock award by roughly 10%, which shocked some staff at the time, the FT report said.

Meta last month laid off about 10% of employees within its Reality Labs group, which had about 15,000 workers, as the company redirects resources from some of its virtual reality products to wearables.

The unit — which has accumulated more than $70 billion in losses since 2021 — includes Meta's ambitious "metaverse" bet.

Meta is building several gigawatt-scale data centers across the United States, including one in rural Louisiana, a project President Donald Trump said would cost $50 billion.

Last month, Meta appointed Trump ally Dina Powell McCormick as president and vice chairman in a bid to drive partnerships with governments and investors for its AI projects.