AI infrastructure faces market stress test! OpenAI plans to issue $38 billion in bonds for related data centers.

The market is about to face a crucial moment to test whether investors are willing to inject "tens of trillions of dollars of capital" into AI infrastructure for the next decade. According to reports, Vantage Data Centers will launch two separate debt financings totaling up to $38 billion as early as next week, to build large data centers in Texas and Wisconsin. These assets will be leased in their entirety to Oracle Corporation (ORCL.US) to provide cloud computing and AI infrastructure capabilities for OpenAI, as part of their participation in the US government-led $500 billion "Stargate" project. Vantage has not yet responded to requests for comment. This financing comes at a time when credit market sentiment is weakening, with bankruptcies in the subprime auto loan industry, rising overnight funding pressures, and a reduction in repo tool balances due to the Fed's balance sheet reduction, all weakening the supply of funds. The strength of demand for this bond issuance may become a key indicator of whether the current momentum in the US stock market and US economy, driven by AI spending, can continue. Last month, Field Asset Management CEO at Bruker Corporation estimated that around $7 trillion in capital will be needed over the next decade to meet AI demand for the construction of factories, computing power infrastructure, and energy systems. Recent practices have shown that investors are still enthusiastic about this race. Meta (META.US) recently raised about $29 billion for the expansion of its Louisiana data center; while Oracle Corporation completed a $18 billion multi-tranche bond issuance in October, with orders totaling $88 billion. During the same week as Vantage's financing landing, five of the seven tech giants will release quarterly earnings and disclose their capital spending and AI investment plans for next year. Citigroup Inc. estimated last month that total capital spending by big tech companies in 2026 will increase to about $490 billion. For companies like Meta, Microsoft Corporation (MSFT.US), and Apple Inc. (AAPL.US) with ample cash flow, funding is not a problem; however, for Oracle Corporation, which may have a cash flow deficit of -$16 billion, and OpenAI with limited revenue, the path is narrower. Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. analysts predict that OpenAI may need to raise about $75 billion through bond issuance or equity issuance next year to fulfill agreements on computing power supply with Oracle Corporation, NVIDIA Corporation (NVDA.US), Broadcom Inc. (AVGO.US), and AMD (AMD.US). Oracle Corporation raised its long-term revenue guidance last week, expecting revenue to reach $225 billion by the end of the century with a compound growth rate of over 30%, but did not provide plans for capital spending after 2026. Bank of America estimates that Oracle Corporation's cumulative capital spending over the next seven years could reach $206 billion, while revenue over the same period is estimated to total around $317 billion. Furthermore, it was reported that the cloud computing agreement between Oracle Corporation and OpenAI signed last month has a scale of $300 billion, accounting for 65% of Oracle Corporation's $455 billion "commitment backlog" order, pushing the stock to a record high in September. This means that the future source of capital spending for Oracle Corporation will largely depend on whether OpenAI can successfully complete large-scale debt financing in the next year.