SpaceX secures $40bn in debt financing, Elon Musk says

SpaceX has secured $40 billion in debt financing to purchase GPUs for AI workloads, Elon Musk has said.

In a post on X yesterday, Musk confirmed rumors that the company was seeking financing to pay for its investments in data centers and other AI infrastructure.

A Financial Times report earlier this month said the debt financing, led by private capital group Apollo, was expected to close in 2027.

In the same post, Musk said that neoclouds could face complications in securing credit for AI infrastructure, claiming that debt markets have “completely dried up” over the past few weeks for companies that don’t have substantial revenue outside of AI data centers.

Musk said that more than 200 neoclouds could see “guppy-level death” as a result. The billionaire’s company offers its own neocloud service via its SpaceXAI data centers, and has signed high-profile compute deals with Anthropic and Google this year.

Fears that the AI buildout could be curbed by hesitant investors have been mounting in recent weeks.

CoreWeave, the largest neocloud, has seen its stock rout over October, dropping 41 percent since October 6. Other neoclouds, including Iren and Nebius, also saw double-digit declines.

Investors are concerned about the levels of debt borrowed to fund the buildout, and reports have emerged that investors are buying credit default swaps to protect their portfolios in the event that returns on AI investment fail to materialize.

Neoclouds have historically relied on bond issuance to fund AI spending. If this source were to dry up, neoclouds could cut capex plans, which in turn could cause trouble for semiconductor providers.

Following Musk’s comments, shares in CoreWeave, Nebius, and Iren all dropped by more than 4 percent in early premarket trading.