03:54 PM EST, 02/26/2025 (MT Newswires) -- Tech stocks were higher late Wednesday afternoon, with the Technology Select Sector SPDR Fund (XLK) rising 0.8% and the SPDR S&P Semiconductor ETF (XSD) climbing 1.4%.

The Philadelphia Semiconductor index added 1.6%.

In corporate news, Alphabet's (GOOG) Google ( GOOG ) unit laid off employees in its cloud division on Wednesday, Bloomberg reported. Alphabet shares were falling 1.3%.

Alibaba's ( BABA ) cloud unit made its AI models for video generation open source and free, the company said Wednesday. Alibaba ( BABA ) shares popped 4.1%.

Amazon.com ( AMZN ) launched Alexa+, the generative artificial intelligence-backed version of its Alexa assistant, during a Wednesday event in New York. Amazon ( AMZN ) shares added 0.7%.

AppLovin ( APP ) shares fell 12% after short sellers Fuzzy Panda and Culper Research released two separate reports with allegations about the company's advertising strategies.