Nvidia holds $99 billion in customer stocks – up from $7 billion in a year

Nvidia holds $99 billion in customer stocks – up from $7 billion in a year

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang recently praised the neocloud companies CoreWeave and Nebius as "doing fantastically" – at the same time, Nvidia's own financial statements show the company has built up an equity portfolio worth $99 billion, up from roughly $7 billion a year earlier. This article walks through how the financing relationship between Nvidia and CoreWeave is actually constructed – equity investment, capacity backstop and purchase commitments – and which numbers show how leveraged the growth of the AI infrastructure boom is.

The News: Huang Defends the Neocloud Model

The concrete news is Huang's appearance at the Goldman Sachs Communacopia + Technology Conference, where he explained the role played by the so-called neoclouds – specialized GPU providers like CoreWeave and Nebius – in Nvidia's growth. "The power of the neoclouds is this," said Huang according to Barchart via Yahoo Finance: "They secure land, power, and shell for us that the CSPs have already exhausted." He singled out CoreWeave and Nebius in particular, saying both are "doing fantastically" (Barchart/Yahoo Finance, source c5c9108e).

The point is practical: the major hyperscalers (CSPs – cloud service providers) do not have enough available data center locations, power capacity and raw building shells to keep up with demand for GPU capacity. The neoclouds take on that role, and Huang also offered a growth picture: by his own account, Nvidia expects roughly 70 percent annual revenue growth next year, even though unconstrained demand is growing at more than 100 percent. These are forward-looking company statements, not verified results.

The comments are not isolated praise. They lend currency to a deal structure that has taken shape through 2026, and that binds Nvidia's revenue more tightly to its customers' balance sheets than classic chip sales do.

The Anatomy of the Deal: Equity, Backstop and Purchase Commitment

The relationship between Nvidia and CoreWeave consists of at least three parts that work together.

The equity investment. In January, Nvidia invested $2 billion in CoreWeave at $87.20 per share, making the chip giant CoreWeave's second-largest shareholder (source 9e1a25cf). This is not just a capital injection: Nvidia now holds equity in a customer that is using the capital to buy Nvidia's own chips.

The purchase commitment. According to the same source, Nvidia had already committed to buying up to $6.3 billion of CoreWeave's unused data center capacity through 2032. These are disclosed deal terms from the companies, which AIMag has not verified against primary documents.

The backstop arrangement. Motley Fool describes a third mechanism: if CoreWeave fails to find customers to lease all the cloud capacity it builds, Nvidia buys the capacity itself – according to this source through April 13, 2032 (source 6bb52edb). Note that the sources date the arrangement differently: cryptobriefing says "through 2032," Motley Fool "through April 13, 2032." Both are company-disclosed terms.

The risk logic of each part is different. The equity investment gives CoreWeave capital without Nvidia having to write anything down immediately – but creates a value interdependence between the two companies. The purchase commitment and the backstop ensure CoreWeave an outlet for the capacity it builds, and thus function in practice as a credit guarantee: they make it easier for CoreWeave to borrow money against future capacity take-up. For Nvidia, they ensure that customers actually buy chips – and that construction projects do not stall for lack of tenants.

The Scale: From $7 to $99 Billion

The CoreWeave deal is not an outlier, but part of a systematic pattern. According to CNBC, Nvidia's equity investments stood at $99 billion as of July 26 – up from roughly $7 billion a year earlier and about $2.2 billion two years earlier. The company has, according to the channel, committed over $40 billion to funding rounds across the AI stack in the past twelve months. The CoreWeave investment in January and a similar investment in Nebius in March are parts of this expansion (source 91cdb84c).

In practice, this means Nvidia is increasingly financing demand for its own products itself – not directly as loans, but through ownership in customers, capacity purchases and guarantees. It is this structure that critics have begun to call "circular financing."

The Customer's Balance Sheet: CoreWeave's Numbers

It is against this backdrop that CoreWeave's quarterly results should be read. The second-quarter results, reported on August 11, showed (source 31a75265):

• Revenue: $2.575 billion (several other sources report $2.58 billion)
• Adjusted EBITDA: $1.510 billion
• Net loss: $626 million
• Net interest expense: $640 million

The company carried, according to Blockonomi, around $33.8 billion in total debt as of June 30, and raised its CAPEX estimate for 2026 to between $35 and $39 billion (source 8708c0f2). Note the source discrepancy here as well: Motley Fool reports the debt as "$35 billion."

The numbers illustrate why accounting distinctions matter. Adjusted EBITDA is solidly positive, but net interest expense alone exceeds a good portion of the company's operating margins in other measures – and the net result is deeply red. With a CAPEX plan that exceeds its own annual revenue, CoreWeave depends on continuous access to new capital. It is precisely that access that the arrangements with Nvidia – equity capital, purchase commitments and the backstop – help secure.

The market prices risk differently in the two companies. As of August 14, 1.23 percent of Nvidia's float was sold short, versus 16.92 percent of CoreWeave's (source 31a75265). Motley Fool noted at the same time that CoreWeave shares traded 41 percent below their historical peak, and Nebius 30 percent below, amid concerns about circular financing (source 6bb52edb).

The Market Reaction – and the Weak Evidence for a Stock Lift

Some frame the story as though the Nvidia investment "could lift the GPU maker's stock." The January market offers weak support for that thesis: CoreWeave shares climbed 9–12 percent after the January 26 announcement, while Nvidia's own stock rose less than 1 percent (source 9e1a25cf). It was the customer, not the investor, that the market rewarded – which is logical, since the value transfer runs from Nvidia's balance sheet to CoreWeave's.

That does not mean the arrangement is worthless to Nvidia. But the gain, if there is one, lies in secured capacity take-up and growth in chip sales over time – not in immediate share price movements.

The Circular Financing Question – Without a Finished Answer

Critics point out that this resembles a loop: Nvidia invests in customers, who spend the money on Nvidia's chips, while Nvidia guarantees the capacity that secures the customers' revenue and borrowing capacity. The companies' own rationale is the opposite: demand exceeds capacity, the major cloud platforms have "exhausted" their locations, and neoclouds are the fastest way to bring compute capacity online. Huang's 70 percent growth guidance and more than 100 percent demand growth are his own account of this picture (source c5c9108e).

Neither interpretation can be settled with the numbers available here. What we can establish is that CoreWeave carries $33.8 billion in debt, a net loss of $626 million in Q2, a CAPEX plan of $35–39 billion – and that its most important supplier is simultaneously its second-largest shareholder, buyer of surplus capacity and backstop through 2032. Whether you call it circular or systematic, the dependence is mutual and growing.

What We Don't Know – and Why Conclusions Should Stay Open

Several concrete uncertainties should make readers cautious about strong inferences:

No primary sources. All five sources in this material are secondary. The original announcement, SEC filings or quarterly reports are not available for verification, and repeat outlets building on the same press releases are not independent confirmation.

Discrepant source figures. CoreWeave's Q2 revenue is reported as $2.58 billion in three sources and $2.575 billion in one; the debt is reported as $33.8 and $35 billion; the backstop date varies between "through 2032" and "through April 13, 2032." The variations are small, but they show that the terms come from the companies' own disclosures that have not been independently checked.

Forward projections. Huang's roughly 70 percent growth guidance and more than 100 percent demand growth are statements about the future, not results. The same applies to the companies' own CAPEX estimates.

Undocumented deal terms. Start dates, pricing and termination terms in the purchase commitments and the backstop arrangement are not documented in this material.

What remains to be proven, then, runs in both directions: neither that the model is sustainable over a full investment cycle, nor that it collapses. What we can say with support in the numbers is that Nvidia's growth is increasingly financed through Nvidia's own balance sheet, that CoreWeave's balance sheet is thin relative to its construction plan, and that the market – through the 16.92 percent short interest and share prices 41 and 30 percent below their peaks – is pricing significant uncertainty into both halves of the loop. Huang's praise at the Goldman Sachs conference and CoreWeave's Q2 numbers point in different directions, and both belong in the same story.