SpaceX discloses a $40 billion GPU lease as Musk warns of neocloud failures

SpaceX described a binding commitment to enter an approximately $40 billion master finance lease covering GPUs and related equipment, with an entity managed by Apollo Global Management.[2] The company called it the largest committed GPU financing.[2] Its filing says the transaction remains subject to specified closing conditions and is expected to close before the end of 2026.[2] Lease schedules are expected to begin when the GPUs and related equipment are delivered, which SpaceX expects in the first half of 2027.[2] Bloomberg, citing people familiar with discussions, reported that pricing talks were still ongoing.[3]

SpaceX said the financing parties were led by Apollo and Goldman Sachs, with Goldman acting as sole structuring agent.[2] The company said anchor commitments came from BlackRock, Goldman Sachs Asset Management and KKR-advised capital accounts.[2] The GPUs are intended to include next-generation NVIDIA Vera Rubin chips for SpaceX’s terrestrial compute buildout.[2] SpaceX said the compute would power Grok for enterprise and consumer users and serve cloud-services customers.[2] Musk said SpaceX is investment grade and has revenue from Starlink and launches.[1]

Musk said that in the preceding weeks, debt markets had almost entirely stopped lending to companies without substantial revenue independent of AI data centers.[1] He predicted that more than 200 neoclouds would face severe failures and consolidation, while saying some would survive.[1] CNBC reported that SpaceX directly competes with neoclouds that rent compute.[4] CNBC also reported CoreWeave and Nebius shares were down more than 30%, Iren was down 40%, and the stocks rebounded later that day.[4] The report said investors were questioning debt-funded expansion and whether AI infrastructure would produce long-term returns.[4]

CNBC reported the sell-off began earlier that month after CoreWeave’s five-year credit-default-swap spread reached levels generally viewed as signs of distress.[4] Chamath Palihapitiya said he expected more partially stranded compute and under-earning inventory in 2027 than forecasts then anticipated.[4] Nebius chief revenue officer Marc Boroditsky said Nebius did not carry the same kind of debt as CoreWeave, and expected its 2027 capacity to sell out if brought online.[4] Iren co-CEO Daniel Roberts said customer demand had not changed despite investor scrutiny, and that customers were discussing multiples of the capacity Iren could bring online the following year.[4]