OpenAI’s partners are carrying $96 billion in debt, highlighting growing risks around the loss-making AI company

Here’s a Financial Times breakdown of the debt held by OpenAI partners:

• $30 billion has already been borrowed by SoftBank, Oracle and CoreWeave.
• $28 billion in loans obtained by Blue All Capital and Cruzo.
• $38 billion is on the table in further talks with Oracle, Vantage and their banks.
• $96 billion total debt.

The increasing use of debt to finance AI is a relatively new development — before this year, most AI builds were funded with cash directly from the balance sheets of big tech companies, such as Microsoft, Alphabet, Amazon, and Meta.

How CoreWeave services its debt will be of particular interest to investors. The company reported $3.7 billion in existing debt, $10.3 billion in non-current debt, and $39.1 billion in future data center lease agreements, in its third-quarter earnings report. The company said it expects to generate just $5 billion in revenue this year, but has $56 billion in “revenue backlog” going forward.

All companies have been contacted for comment. CoreWeave declined to comment when contacted luck.

Separately, the Big Five — Amazon, Google, Meta, Microsoft and Oracle — took on $121 billion in new debt this year to fund their AI operations, according to Bank of America. This is more than four times the average level of debt ($28 billion) issued by these companies over the past five years.

A recent research note from Bank of America analysts Yuri Seliger and Seohyun Marie Lee said all the additional investment-grade corporate debt is having a material impact on credit markets.

“This week (the week before Thanksgiving) is typically the last week of the year with a big offering from IG. The 2025 offering ends the year strong,” they said. “We are tracking about $50 billion for this week and about $220 billion over the previous four weeks — about 70% above typical volume for this time of year.”

“This year… super manufacturing companies added another $63 billion. This suggests that the entire increase in supply this year can be explained by [debt-funded M&A deals] And super active.”

The growing supply of debt from technology companies is moving up “spreads” — the extra interest yield demanded by debt buyers above the theoretical risk-free rate — in the credit default swap (CDS) market, according to Deutsche Bank. Credit default swaps act as a type of insurance policy on corporate debt, paying out holders if a creditor defaults. If yields on credit default swaps increase, this indicates that the market believes the probability of default has also risen.

“The moves have been notable: Oracle 5-year CDS have widened by about +60 basis points to 104 basis points since late September and CoreWeave by +280 basis points to about 640 basis points since September,” Deutsche’s Jim Reed said in a recent note.

“It is difficult to know yet whether this shift will have meaningful long-term implications,” he said, “but the past few weeks clearly represent a new phase of the AI ​​boom — one in which investors are increasingly looking to hedge their risks, and one in which public credit markets are being called on to fund growing capital expenditure needs. It’s not just free cash flow for those with significant expansion anymore.”