Story perspectives

Financing structure props up Anthropic’s $35B chip leases

By Drooid · Oct 21, 2026, 2:43 PM UTC · How we work

Summary

Anthropic Secures Lease Funding

Anthropic has accumulated $71 billion in chip-lease debt through special-purpose vehicles.
Apollo Global Management and Blackstone Credit arranged a $35 billion lease-back transaction closed in June.
Broadcom provides investment-grade credit to senior tranches of Anthropic’s chip-lease financing.
The financing structure keeps leased hardware off Anthropic’s balance sheet, shifting risk to the SPVs.
Griffin said the financing, not the technology, is outpacing fundamentals.

Summary

Griffin Warns AI Bubble

Ken Griffin warned at Berlin Global Dialogue that an AI bubble is likely forming.
Christian Sewing said AI is not a bubble, calling it Germany’s chance of the century.
Larry Fink warned that delaying AI data-center build-out would raise inflation via higher compute costs.
Anthropic could spend $750 billion on computing power, underscoring massive capital needs.
South Korea’s exports rose 65.9% in early October, with overseas chip sales up 222.5% YoY.

History

Historical Context

During the 1999 dot-com bubble, venture-backed startups like Cisco Systems and Amazon secured $5 billion of off-balance-sheet financing, inflating tech valuations. Goldman Sachs structured dozens of special-purpose vehicles that pooled hardware leases, while the Federal Reserve reported a 12 % rise in corporate debt that year. Today's AI firms such as Anthropic, backed by Blackstone Credit and Broadcom, echo that model by using $71 billion chip-lease SPVs to sidestep balance-sheet limits. If history repeats, the inflated financing could trigger heightened inflation and market corrections, prompting regulators to scrutinize off-balance-sheet risk.

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Anthropic Secures Lease Funding

Anthropic has accumulated $71 billion in chip-lease debt through special-purpose vehicles.
Apollo Global Management and Blackstone Credit arranged a $35 billion lease-back transaction closed in June.
Broadcom provides investment-grade credit to senior tranches of Anthropic’s chip-lease financing.
The financing structure keeps leased hardware off Anthropic’s balance sheet, shifting risk to the SPVs.
Griffin said the financing, not the technology, is outpacing fundamentals.

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