Leaning Tight: Volatility and credit stay calm, the Fed鈥檚 balance sheet is stable, but the Committee hiked 11 days ago; inflation is sticky at 3.4% and margin leverage is still building. That mix stays restrictive for high-beta crypto and AI-infra names even with markets quiet into the open.
Market Performance
It was a mixed week for the sector: 47 of the names we track fell versus 40 that rose (median -0.9%). NUAI (20.47%), INTC (13.25%) and META (12.90%) led top gains. Bitcoin mining Index lost 4.5% over the last 5 days.
Major Company Updates
- Cipher Digital expands Barber Lake lease term to 20 years, increasing revenue to over $9 billion (link)
- CleanSpark, Inc. announces closing of $2.276 billion of senior secured notes (link)
- New Era Energy & Digital secures 20-year, 207 MW PPA with Vistra (link)
- Solaris Energy Infrastructure announces pricing of upsized offering of $1.25 billion of 7.000% senior notes due 2032 (link)
- Core Scientific appoints Jay Elms as chief commercial officer (link)
- CoreWeave becomes the only provider to earn SemiAnalysis' Platinum ClusterMAX rating three consecutive times (link)
- SGE, GE Vernova, Hitachi and Samsung C&T sign MoU to advance BWRX-300 fleet deployment in Europe (link)
Must read: Oracle cites "Force Majeure" to shield itself on controversial data center (link)
What happened: On Sep 24, Bloomberg reported that Oracle had sent a force majeure notice to the Blue Owl unit developing Project Jupiter, Oracle's 1,400-acre AI campus in New Mexico, citing possible delays in securing power. If power isn't ready in time, the notice lets Oracle stay on lower development-stage rent for longer before operating rent kicks in. Oracle can't terminate the lease and says the project remains on schedule.
Cindy's thoughts: Jupiter shows the cost of delay even when the tenant is locked in. Because Oracle held the power obligation, it can keep rent at the development rate (roughly 9% yield vs. 11% once operating) for as long as three years. In most miner-to-AI leases the landlord has to deliver the power, so for our cohort the live risk is the gap between contracted megawatts and energized megawatts.
As always, feel free to drop us a message for any suggestions, feedback, or just to say hi.
Thanks for being part of our journey - see you next week!
Cindy & the Ziven Team 馃挏