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SpaceX is in discussions to raise about $40 billion to buy artificial-intelligence chips from Nvidia, according to reporting published Wednesday, October 7. The proposed financing would combine roughly $10 billion in bank loans with $30 billion in investment-grade debt, with Apollo Global Management expected to lead the effort.
The talks are at an early stage and may not result in a completed deal, people familiar with the discussions told Bloomberg, whose report was carried by The Business Times. The financing is reportedly expected to close in 2027. PIMCO is among the investment managers considering participation, while the companies involved have not confirmed the proposed arrangement.
A proposed mix of loans and bonds
The reported structure would make bank borrowing a quarter of the planned package, with the larger share raised through investment-grade debt. Apollo is expected to help arrange the financing and distribute debt to investors, according to the reports. No final terms, interest rates, maturities or lender commitments have been disclosed.
The distinction between a fundraising plan and a completed transaction is material: the discussions could change or end without an agreement. The reported 2027 closing timetable is an expectation, not a confirmed date. Reuters, citing the Financial Times, also reported the proposed $10 billion loan and $30 billion debt split, but said it could not immediately verify the original report.
Chip demand tied to AI expansion
The planned purchase would support SpaceX’s growing use of Nvidia hardware for AI computing. Elon Musk said during a SpaceX earnings call in August that the company had decided to build exclusively on Nvidia technology for its AI projects, citing the company’s Vera Rubin architecture. The financing report does not specify how many processors SpaceX wants to acquire, their delivery schedule or the locations where they would be deployed.
Musk has also described an expansion at Colossus 2, an AI computing cluster built by his xAI business. In September, he said the cluster could more than double its Nvidia chip count by the end of 2026. Bloomberg reported that Musk had identified 110,000 Nvidia GB200 chips and 440,000 GB300 chips at the site, with further GB300 installations planned; those figures describe the cluster’s stated rollout, not the size of the reported SpaceX order.
Financing arrives amid wider AI investment
The proposed borrowing comes as technology companies and AI developers seek large amounts of capital to acquire processors and build data centers. Reuters reported that Nvidia announced a financing partnership in August involving Apollo, BlackRock, Blackstone, Brookfield, Goldman Sachs and KKR, intended to mobilize more than $500 billion for AI infrastructure. That broad initiative is separate from the reported SpaceX financing, and its announcement does not confirm that funds have been committed to this transaction.
For Apollo, the proposed deal would add to its activity in financing technology and infrastructure. Investing.com reported that Apollo recently led a $35 billion chip-financing transaction for Broadcom processors. The SpaceX proposal would be significantly larger, but its reported size should not be treated as a closed deal or a binding commitment from Apollo or any prospective investor.
Debt-market and company context
Investing.com reported that SpaceX received an investment-grade credit rating after its $86 billion initial public offering in June and sold $25 billion of high-grade bonds less than two weeks later. It also reported that the bonds subsequently came under pressure amid investor concerns about the company’s debt and capital spending. The outlet cited MarketAxess data showing SpaceX bonds due in 2056 trading at about 85 cents on the dollar, with a yield around 2.27 percentage points above U.S. Treasuries.
Those figures provide context for the scale of additional borrowing under discussion, but do not establish what rating or pricing a new bond issue would receive. SpaceX, Nvidia and Apollo did not immediately respond to requests for comment in reports published Wednesday; Reuters reported that PIMCO declined to comment. Whether the talks advance, who ultimately provides the capital and when any financing could close remain unresolved.
