What happens to an industry where demand is skyrocketing but which suddenly can’t get any more money?

This question has been on everyone’s mind since yesterday. Elon Musk wrote on X that the credit markets had AI data center operators. Just a few days earlier, the Nebius CEO himself had admitted that key sources of capital had temporarily dried up.

1. The Statements

• Elon Musk: In recent weeks, the credit markets have cut off all companies without significant revenue outside of AI data centers had almost completely cut off access to funding. $SPCX (-2,67%) I’ve taken on $40 billion in debt for GPUs, but only thanks to investment-grade (= high creditworthiness according to rating agencies) and revenue from Starlink and rocket launches. He predicts a mass extinction and consolidation . He rules out the possibility of SpaceX acquiring any Neoclouds.
• Chamath Palihapitiya: Neoclouds are disorganized and poorly capitalized. By 2027, there will be a lot of partially unused computing capacity, and that year will weed out many bad investments.
• Arkady Volozh, CEO of $NBIS (-11,73%): Asset-backed financing and debt markets have temporarily dried up. Nebius is working with customer prepayments and other instruments that should be sufficient to build at least the one gigawatt planned for this year.
• Gartner: As early as mid-October, the research firm predicted that by 2030, over 80% of neoclouds would no longer be independent.

Context: Musk is a direct competitor to traditional Neoclouds, as he rents out GPU capacity himself—SpaceX could benefit from negative headlines.

2. Why a lack of capital affects the valuation:

Neoclouds build and buy first, but the money doesn’t come back for years.

This results in a simple chain:

1. Growth requires capital.

2. Capital becomes expensive or is no longer provided at all: CoreWeave bonds $CRWV (-7,82%) maturing in 2031 yielded at times nearly 16%. At this price, projects are barely profitable, so this funding channel is largely closed.

3. Valuations factor in high growth: The market has priced in years of capacity expansion.

4. This growth cannot be delivered without capital: What isn’t financed won’t be built. Lower growth → lower stock prices. On top of that, companies are raising capital by issuing new shares at low prices, which dilutes the holdings of existing shareholders dilutes and creates further downward pressure.

5. Valuations are coming under pressure: Growth expectations are falling, while at the same time the interest rate used to discount future earnings is rising.

4. How are different types of financing affected?

Closed channels:

• Unsecured high-yield bonds
• GPU loans without high-credit-quality customers
• Asset-backed financing for Neoclouds

Open, but tighter and more expensive:

• Secured loans with investment-grade borrowers: Nebius received on October 22 $3.5 billion from $C (+0,44%), though with a term of only one year
• Stock sales that dilute shares more significantly when prices are low

Outstanding:

• Customer prepayments
• Bonds for hyperscalers and corporations with other sources of revenue

5. Why isn’t a booming business getting funding?

Investors aren’t short on money. $GOOGL (-1,54%), $AMZN (-0,59%), $META (+2,47%) and $ORCL (-2%) have invested over $228 billion in bonds.

The reason lies in the lender’s logic:

• No share in the boom: If GPU rental rates double, the shareholder benefits. The lender receives only the interest, but bears the loss in the event of a crisis.
• Uncertain collateral: Financiers estimate that a GPU’s value after three years will be 10 to 60 percent of the original price. This is a huge range when billions are invested in GPUs.
• Macro: Due to the Fed’s interest rate hike in September and an oil price above $100 caused by the war in Iran, new issuances in the high-yield market plummeted in October.

Has this ever happened before?

• Data Centers in 2001: Exodus Communications, then one of the largest data center operators, went bankrupt, and its facilities were sold off cheaply. Equinix $EQIX (-1,8%) barely survived, $DLR (-1,63%) and was later formed from acquired real estate. Data centers became a huge business—but only for the next owners.
• Fiber Optics 2000–2002: The demand for the Internet was real, but funding dried up. Global Crossing and WorldCom went bankrupt.
• Shale Gas 2015/16: The high-yield energy market dried up; many producers went bankrupt, and the most cost-effective ones took over the rest.
• Crypto Miners 2022: Core Scientific filed for bankruptcy and is now an AI rental provider itself.

The pattern is always the same: When the capital market closes for a capital-intensive industry, the balance sheet, not demand. In these examples, macro-driven freezes lasted weeks to months, while freezes affecting an entire industry lasted about one to three years.

6. Which Neoclouds are affected

The key factor is the business model:

• Landlords with tenants of high creditworthiness:
  $CIFR (-5,7%) with Amazon as the direct tenant, $WULF (-4,88%) backed by Google. In the case of $HUT (-8,29%), $CLSK (-4,52%) and $RIOT (-2,78%) investment-grade credit protection is still pending. Banks are primarily reviewing the tenant in these cases, which is why financing continues. They benefit very little from the rise in GPU prices because their rents are locked in for 10–20 years.
• Landlords with a large CoreWeave stake: Galaxy $GLXY (-4,93%) and Core Scientific, and to some extent also $APLD (-7,26%), where a hyperscaler now accounts for the majority of tenants. Their risk hinges on the industry’s weak link.
• GPU clouds: $IREN (-8,47%) , $NBIS (-11,73%) , $CRWV (-7,82%) , $USCTF (-4,9%) and $BTDR (-8,96%) . This is exactly the channel Musk is referring to. Nebius relies on contracts with $MSFT (+0,54%) and Meta, while IREN relies on Microsoft; on top of that, there are substantial upfront payments: At Nebius, they cover about 50–60%, and at IREN, about 45% of the respective investments. CoreWeave, on the other hand, contributes about $50 billion in debt and lease obligations.
• Without a signed AI contract:
  $MARA (-4,13%) and $KEEL (-5,68%). They need customers and financing in the midst of the lockdown.

7. Conclusion

Overall, Musk’s statement is exaggerated, but essentially correct: For companies that only sell GPU rentals and don’t have customers with high credit ratings, the credit market is currently closed.

However, there’s a contradiction in this situation: What isn’t financed won’t be built, and that further reduces supply further, while Musk himself speaks of exploding demand .

Companies that can finance their capacity are likely to benefit from this.

Customers who urgently need computing power will become more aware of this problem, which could potentially increase prepayments for contracts. In addition, customers could use their own creditworthiness as collateral for their AI computing power providers or become lenders themselves.

In my view, therefore, one question above all else will determine the future of the industry:

Who can secure financing to sustain these growth rates?

The quarterly results in November will provide answers; particular attention should be paid to the financing structure and prepayments.

Sources:

https://x.com/elonmusk/status/2114434646914068862

https://x.com/chamath/status/2114389987563381004

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-10-25/musk-says-spacex-closed-40-billion-debt-deal-blasts-neoclouds

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ElxZFG9lfmQ

https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/0001513845/000110465926117978/tm2628078d1_ex99-1.htm

https://www.cnbc.com/2026/10/14/coreweave-stock-bond-yields-ai-debt.html

https://www.advisorperspectives.com/articles/2026/10/21/surging-yields-biggest-debt-sale-delay

$NVDA (-1,98%)$AMD (-8,7%)$MU (-2,7%)

Moonshot AI posted the following update on Sunday:

"Kimi K3 has been much more popular than we expected, and our GPUs are feeling the strain.

Over the past 48 hours, demand has nearly reached the limits of our current capacity. To protect the experience of existing subscribers, we’re temporarily pausing new subscriptions and prioritizing computing power for current members. Existing subscribers are not affected by this.

We’re scaling up additional capacity as quickly as possible and will gradually reopen new subscription slots in batches.

Going forward, we’ll also be splitting the membership into two more targeted plans: Kimi Membership for Kimi Web, App, and Work, and Kimi Code Membership for coding workflows. This will help us allocate computing power more precisely and keep the experience stable.

Thank you very much for your patience and understanding!"

$IREN (-8,47%)
$NBIS (-11,73%)
$CRWV (-7,82%)
$HUT (-8,29%)
$CLSK (-4,52%)
$KEEL (-5,68%)
$USCTF (-4,9%)
$APLD (-7,26%)
$WULF (-4,88%)
$CIFR (-5,7%)
$ (-6%)HIVE (-6%)

$NVDA (-1,98%)

Nvidia announced a new partnership model for Neoclouds (specialized GPU cloud providers): Nvidia acts as a financial backstop and commits to leasing back unused GPU capacity at a fixed price. In return, Nvidia receives a share of its partners’ cloud revenue in addition to hardware revenue.

• First partners: Firmus (170,000 GPUs in Indonesia) and Sharon AI (40,000 GB300 GPUs)
• Predecessors: similar deals with $CRWV (-7,82%) (6.3 billion $, 2025) and Lambda (1.5 billion $)

$NBIS (-11,73%)$USCTF (-4,9%)$CIFR (-5,7%)$WULF (-4,88%)$APLD (-7,26%)$KEEL (-5,68%)$CORZ (+1,86%)$HIVE (-6%)$BTDR (-8,96%)$CLSK (-4,52%)$MARA (-4,13%)$HUT (-8,29%)$RIOT (-2,78%)

$IREN (-8,47%) has so far not named as a participant—but has had a strategic partnership with Nvidia since May covering up to 5 GW of AI infrastructure, a $3.4 billion cloud contract , and Nvidia holds the right to purchase up to 2.1 billion IREN shares .

Adopting this model seems like a very logical step, since IREN will require extremely high investment costs (>$100 billion) to expand its entire pipeline.

In my view, this would be very positive in the short to medium term.

The biggest risk with $IREN (-8,47%) and other Neocloud providers is not demand, but rather the financing of their expansion plans, which run into the billions. A backstop from Nvidia would mitigate precisely this risk: Banks are much more willing to grant loans when the world’s largest chipmaker guarantees capacity utilization—this would provide significant security and more favorable, virtually lower-risk financing. However, the revenue share would directly impact the profit margin . In the long term, companies would thereby cede part of their overall potential to Nvidia—essentially trading long-term profitability for medium-term security.

Source: https://www.datacenterdynamics.com/en/news/nvidia-acts-as-backstop-for-customer-gpus-in-return-for-cut-of-cloud-revenue/

If you're wondering what's going on with the former $BTC (-3,61%) miners who work in data centers today, here is the answer.😉

I'm still waiting for a deal at $BITF (-5,68%) as has been rumored before with $AMZN (-0,59%) 🤑

The shares of Riot Platforms (NASDAQ:RIOT) rose by over 7% on Friday morning after the Bitcoin mining company announced the conclusion of a data center lease agreement with Advanced Micro Devices (NASDAQ:AMD)had announced.

The company announced the signing of a ten-year data center lease and services agreement with AMD at its Rockdale, Texas location. The agreement includes an initial deployment of 25 MW of critical IT load capacity to be delivered in phases from January 2026 through May 2026, with a potential expansion to 200 MW.

Riot expects the agreement to generate approximately $311 million in contract revenue over the initial term. Should AMD exercise all three five-year renewal options, total contract revenue could increase to approximately USD 1 billion.

"This partnership is a validation of our infrastructure, development capabilities, the attractiveness of our sites, our readily available power capacity and our ability to provide innovative solutions to meet the needs of world-class tenants," said Jason Les, CEO of Riot.

In conjunction with the lease, Riot also announced the closing of the unrestricted purchase of 200 acres of land at its Rockdale site for $96 million. The purchase was financed entirely through the sale of approximately 1,080 Bitcoin from the company's balance sheet.

The Rockdale site has a 700 MW grid connection, a dedicated water supply and fiber optic connections. With this acquisition, Riot now owns and manages over 1,100 acres of land and 1.7 GW of power capacity at its two sites in Texas.

Hasmukh Ranjan, CIO of AMD, commented: "At AMD, advancing high-performance computing and AI requires partners that can keep up with our pace and scale. We look forward to working with Riot, whose capabilities, power availability and high-density solutions align with our infrastructure roadmap."

The initial deployment will utilize Riot's existing infrastructure, with the company starting with the retrofit of an existing building at a cost of $89.8 million.

$IREN (-8,47%)
$NBIS (-11,73%)
$BITF (-5,68%)
$CIFR (-5,7%)
$BTC (-3,61%)
$CLSK (-4,52%)
$RIOT (-2,78%)
$MARA (-4,13%)
$HIVE (-6%)

https://de.investing.com/news/stock-market-news/rechenzentrumsdeal-mit-amd-beflugelt-riotaktie-93CH-3304409

Next one.💪🏻

This time, from my point of view, exciting developments regarding my portfolio value $HIVE (-6%) which were explained in a press release:

San Antonio, Texas--(Newsfile Corp. - January 13, 2026)

HIVE Digital Technologies Ltd (TSXV: HIVE) (NASDAQ: HIVE) (FWB: YO0) (BVC: HIVECO) (the "Company" or "HIVE"), a diversified global digital infrastructure company headquartered in San Antonio, Texas.

digital infrastructure company headquartered in San Antonio, Texas, today announced its

expansion into Paraguay through a strategic joint venture with Paraguay's

Paraguay's leading telecommunications operator.

As part of this partnership, HIVE is introducing one of the first purpose-built BUZZ artificial intelligence cloud platforms in Paraguay, located in Asunción and hosted in a Tier III data center of the leading telecom operator in Paraguay. The platform is designed to provide high performance computing (HPC) and AI infrastructure for academic and research institutions, enterprises, financial service providers and healthcare providers in Paraguay and the entire South American region.

The first deployment is scheduled to begin in the first quarter of 2026 and will initially

with an enterprise-class GPU cluster that will be used for AI training, inference

inference and data-intensive workloads. The platform will be

scaled over time according to customer demand and subject to capital

availability of capital, with Paraguay's renewable hydropower, the national glass

Paraguay, the national fiber optic network of Paraguay's largest telecommunications provider and enterprise-class data centers.

This expansion builds on HIVE's existing digital infrastructure in Paraguay, where the company develops and operates Tier I data centers and associated substations supported by access to large-scale renewable hydropower electricity. HIVE views Bitcoin mining as a means to build Tier I data center infrastructure and substations that monetize excess or unused electricity.

monetize surplus or unused electricity and convert energy into economic value.

into economic value. In this framework, each Bitcoin represents a bundle of energy, a concept also

concept that has also been articulated by technology leaders such as Elon Musk and Jensen Huang in their discussions of Bitcoin as a form of monetized economic labor. The infrastructure required for production can serve as the fundamental basis for more advanced digital computing applications, including AI and high performance computing hosted in Tier III data centers.

HIVE's strategy in Paraguay is based on a long-term, multi-year vision to further develop energy-based digital infrastructure into scalable AI and data center capacity. The company believes that

believes that the growth of the AI-driven digital economy depends on a reliable

depends on a reliable power supply and high-performance dark fiber connectivity that enables secure, low-latency data transmission.

with low latency. While Tier III data centers that can host GPU-intensive workloads require significantly higher capital investments

HIVE believes that its phased approach - starting with Tier I infrastructure - provides a disciplined and economically efficient path to higher-value AI-enabled facilities.

facilities.

Paraguay has experienced periods of strong economic growth in recent quarters

supported by a stable government and an investment-friendly policy environment. HIVE believes that

these conditions, combined with the country's energy profile, provide a

constructive backdrop for long-term investment in digital infrastructure.

infrastructure.

HIVE believes that this development is broadly consistent with the development of

digital infrastructure in Texas, including the San Antonio to West Texas

corridor from San Antonio to West Texas, where development began with Tier I data centers focused on energy-intensive workloads and later expanded to capital-intensive Tier III facilities that can support advanced enterprise and AI workloads.

workloads. The company believes that Paraguay is at a similar early stage in this infrastructure

similar early stage in this infrastructure development cycle, while recognizing that the

recognizing that outcomes will depend on a number of economic and regulatory factors.

and regulatory factors.

The company anticipates that continued investment in AI and HPC infrastructure will

and HPC infrastructure could support downstream economic activity, including potentially

activity, including a potential increase in demand for software

software developers, computer engineers, data scientists,

electrical engineers and other technical professionals, which over time would

would contribute to workforce development over time.

The expansion also reflects Paraguay's continued institutional commitment

Paraguay's ongoing institutional commitment to the United States. On December 15, 2025

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Paraguayan Foreign Minister Rubén Ramírez

Foreign Minister Rubén Ramírez Lezcano in Washington, D.C., signed a

Troop Stationing Agreement (SOFA) between the United States and Paraguay.

Paraguay. While SOFAs are a common instrument of US foreign policy with countries such as

countries such as Germany, Italy and Japan, the agreement reflects continued

continued bilateral cooperation in areas such as security, stability

stability and law enforcement, which could contribute to greater institutional

could contribute to greater institutional trust.

The launch of the BUZZ AI cloud platform is designed to support the demand for accelerated computing across South America by providing companies with access to an AI infrastructure that operates in a Tier III environment and is powered by renewable energy.

Tier III environment and powered by renewable energy.

While future expansions will depend on the expansion of infrastructure such as dark fiber

fiber, customer demand, regulatory conditions and the availability of

availability of capital, HIVE believes that the conditions in Paraguay are

conditions in Paraguay are favorable for long-term participation in the development of

development of AI and hyperscale data centers.

Frank Holmes, Executive Chairman of HIVE, said: "Paraguay is an important location for HIVE

important location for HIVE, where we have demonstrated how energy-based digital

infrastructure can support long-term value creation. This

development is consistent with patterns we have observed in Texas, including in the

including in the San Antonio area, where infrastructure development began with Tier I data centers and later expanded to capital-intensive Tier III facilities capable of hosting demanding AI workloads. We are convinced that the

economic stability, the supportive political environment and the institutional

institutional relationships in Paraguay provide a constructive basis for the further

further development of the digital infrastructure."

Aydin Kilic, President and CEO of HIVE, added: "The launch of the AI cloud infrastructure in Asunción is a first step in bringing science

research institutions, companies, financial service providers and healthcare

healthcare organizations access to local high-performance computing capacity.

capacity. This initiative complements the existing operation of HIVE's Tier I data center in Paraguay, which currently uses around 300 megawatts of

and, subject to market conditions and approvals, will be expanded by a further 100 megawatts in 2026.

could be expanded by a further 100 megawatts."

HIVE believes that Paraguay's combination of renewable energy sources, stable governance, supportive policy framework and growing digital infrastructure make it a potential

political framework and growing digital infrastructure, Paraguay has the

potential to play an important long-term role in South America in the field of AI

and high-performance computing.

https://de.investing.com/news/press-releases/eqsnews-hive-digital-expandiert-nach-paraguay-und-entwickelt-erste-spezielle-ai-buzz-cloudplattform-deutsch-3298968

$BTC (-3,61%)
$NBIS (-11,73%)
$IREN (-8,47%)
$BITF (-5,68%)
$CIFR (-5,7%)
$CLSK (-4,52%)

Good morning, my dears,

There has been a lot of positive news flow in the last few days, which I naturally don't want to withhold from you.

Since you have to start somewhere, let's start with $IREN (-8,47%) .😉

H.C. Wainwright has bought the shares of IREN Ltd. (NASDAQ:IREN) from "Neutral" to "Buy" and set a price target of 80.00 US dollars. The reason given is the company's strong positioning in the AI infrastructure sector. This target implies considerable upside potential compared to the current share price of USD 50.43.

The analyst firm assumes that AI infrastructure will remain a key investment theme in 2026. This will be driven by hyperscalers' investment budgets, growing demand for access to large power capacities and positive investor sentiment. This is in line with IREN's impressive revenue growth of 235% over the last twelve months.

H.C. Wainwright particularly highlighted IREN's five-year, USD 9.7 billion AI cloud contract with Microsoft. This is expected to be fully monetized by the end of 2026 and generate annual recurring revenues of USD 1.94 billion once the entire 200 MW of critical IT power has been deployed at the Childress site. The company also has a solid financial position with a current ratio of 5.52, which indicates that cash and cash equivalents significantly exceed current liabilities.

The analyst firm also referred to IREN's development pipeline, which includes additional capacity of over 2 GW and is expected to be fully operational by 2027. This offers considerable growth potential for the company's AI cloud business. With analysts forecasting revenue growth of 117% for the 2026 financial year, IREN's expansion plans appear well positioned to drive future business development.

IREN shares have corrected by around 35% since their all-time highs in early November 2025, which H.C. Wainwright sees as an attractive entry point. At the same time, it points out that the company recently raised USD 2.3 billion via convertible bonds to finance the expansion of its AI data centers. Despite the recent setback, IREN achieved a remarkable return of 381% last year.

$BTC (-3,61%)
$NBIS (-11,73%)
$CIFR (-5,7%)
$BITF (-5,68%)
$HIVE (-6%)
$CLSK (-4,52%)

https://de.investing.com/news/analyst-ratings/hc-wainwright-stuft-iren-auf-buy-hoch-und-setzt-kursziel-auf-80-usdollar-93CH-3299309

Hello everyone,

It's crazy what happened on the markets today, isn't it? And that despite (or because of?) the events at the weekend.

As you can see from the header, I don't want to withhold from you what happened in my portfolio today, so:

Daily performance: +3.84%

Top performer (how could it be otherwise, of course defense and AI/data centers, since CES 2026 started today):

$ONDS (-3,73%) +13,45%

$IREN (-8,47%) +12,51%

$CIFR (-5,7%) +11,19%

$BITF (-5,68%) +11,06%

$HIVE (-6%) +9,02%

I would also like to make special mention of $ZETA (-3,39%) with a daily gain of 8.18%. I have been really pleased with the share since it found its way into my portfolio (thanks to @MozartTrading who introduced Zeta here and drew my attention to it in the first place). Let's see how things continue here.

And now: cards on the table, @Tenbagger2024
@Multibagger
@Klein-Anleger and everyone else, how did your day go?

Hope your portfolios went up today 🚀

Edit to $ZETA (-3,39%) : Just received an info on OpenAI partnership, share went up again right after the market close with another set.

https://de.investing.com/news/company-news/zeta-global-und-openai-partnerschaft-zur-starkung-der-marketingki-athena-93CH-3287930

This or something similar could be my personal headline for 02.01.2026.

In addition to receiving my letter of congratulations on passing my probationary period after changing jobs last summer, it was of course another savings plan day.

In addition to the investments worth the equivalent of €1,375 to be collected there every month (€25 in $ATAI has not yet gone through due to the relocation to the USA, so I'm curious to see whether the NASDAQ-listed securities are still eligible for the savings plan😅), a further €1,000 has found its way into the market and thus into my portfolio.

In this case, it was not a "quick 1-2 new positions between the holidays" action like a few days ago (the days were really crazy to say the least with the price movements of some stocks with rather thin volumes), but a targeted increase in some of my existing positions, which were of course already provided with a savings plan.

I have done the same thing from time to time in recent months with the previously smaller savings plan positions in my portfolio, and this time was no exception.

This time, I increased the positions in equal parts:

$BNTX (+0,39%)

$ANET (-4,94%)

$FTNT (-1,41%)

$BA. (+0,22%)

Overall, I am quite satisfied with my current portfolio structure, but I will sit down from time to time during the course of the year and review existing positions, check my investment theses and probably also simply take profits on stocks that are more "bets" than long-term investments for me ($BITF (-5,68%) , $HIVE (-6%) , $REKR (-21,68%) , $FBIO and one or two in the rare earth/critical raw materials sector).

A few new positions may then be added, but the aim here is clearly to liquidate positions first (where appropriate) and only then to open further positions.

How are you doing? How did your first trading day of the year go? Do you also have one or more of the stocks mentioned in your portfolio? How do you feel about them?