Broadcom, Oracle and SpaceX each pursue AI chip debt deals, led by Broadcom's $50 billion-plus OpenAI package

AVGO, ORCL and SpaceX (SPCX) are in talks to secure blockbuster private debt deals worth tens of billions of dollars each to buy AI hardware, according to The Wall Street Journal. The three efforts are separate, and only Broadcom's is tied to OpenAI: Broadcom is working on a financing package of more than $50 billion for the custom AI chips it is building with OpenAI. Bloomberg also reported early talks; secondary accounts name Apollo and Blackstone among the lenders and note it has not been disclosed who would borrow the money.

SpaceX is seeking about $40 billion to buy NVDA chips, split between roughly $10 billion of bank loans and $30 billion of investment-grade debt, with Apollo leading, according to TradingKey and 24/7 Wall St. Oracle is in discussions with Apollo and Goldman Sachs on a structure in which investors fund an independent company that buys chips and leases them to Oracle, keeping the debt off Oracle's balance sheet; no amount has been disclosed. On Thursday, Broadcom rose 0.19% to $376.51, Oracle slipped 0.84% to $143.56 and SpaceX fell 2.51% to $167.60, per 24/7 Wall St.

The talks extend an AI borrowing wave that is already testing debt markets. Tech companies have borrowed roughly $500 billion in the first nine months of this year, Goldman Sachs expects about $1.2 trillion in 2027, and AI-related borrowing now accounts for around 25% of corporate bond issuance versus 4% two years ago, while the 10-year Treasury yield has moved above 5.30%, its highest since 2002. Separately, Broadcom has been lining up financing for Anthropic, including up to $42 billion in loans and a roughly $60 billion chip-leasing support package.

What to watch: final sizes, borrowers and lenders for each deal, since all three remain at the talks stage; how lenders treat chips as collateral, given that SpaceX's existing bonds average 11.7 years to maturity and can outlast the hardware they fund; and SpaceX's five-year credit default swap spread, which has widened to 194 basis points from about 110 when trading began in June.