Nvidia's 'I'm Not Enron' memo has people asking a lot of questions (opens in new tab)

(theverge.com)

8 pointsgreg_V4mo ago4 comments

4 comments

Meta owns 20%, and funds managed by Blue Owl own the other 80%. Last month, a holding company called Beignet Investor, which owns the Blue Owl portion, sold a then-record $27.3 billion of bonds to investors, mostly to Pimco. Meta said it won’t be consolidating the joint venture, meaning the venture’s assets and liabilities will remain off Meta’s balance sheet. Instead Meta will rent the data center for as long as 20 years, beginning in 2029. But it will start with a four-year lease term, with options to renew every four years.

This lease structure minimizes the lease liabilities and related assets Meta will recognize, and enables Meta to use “operating lease,” rather than “finance lease,” treatment. If Meta used the latter, it would look more like Meta owns the asset and is financing it with debt.

The favorable accounting outcome hinges on some convenient assumptions. Some appear implausible, while others are in tension with one another, making the off-balance-sheet treatment look questionable.

https://www.wsj.com/tech/meta-ai-data-center-finances-d3a6b4...

aurareturn4mo ago

These "AI bubble" pop stories are tiring. Vast majority of them fall into one of these categories:

* They're hoping AI doesn't get good enough that their job is made redundant. Calling it an AI bubble and saying it will collapse is copium.

* They feel like they missed investing in AI and is now hoping AI stocks drop 50-80% so they can finally buy in

* They work in a job that AI hasn't penetrated deeply yet so they're unaware of just how useful it is even today

Most of these journalists, who are so sure that we're in an AI bubble and it's going to collapse, do not have an economic background nor tech background. I don't understand how they are so confident.

In general, the mass media is very much anti-tech. Even before the AI boom, the mass media is overwhelmingly negative on big tech companies and most startups. Of course they are cheering/hoping for an AI collapse.

hvb23mo ago

> Most of these journalists, who are so sure that we're in an AI bubble and it's going to collapse, do not have an economic background nor tech background. I don't understand how they are so confident.

Barring the unlikely scenario that you're privy to the financials of all the big vendors, you are just as guilty as they might be. You've just on the other side.

You don't have to be anti tech in order to question valuations or investments the likes of which are going into AI

worik3mo ago

Yea, nah

The commitments made to build data centre's defy the laws of physics, but if they cannot be built the revenue will not appear.

Meanwhile the Chinese, and a thousand independent developers, are working out how to build, train and run models with much less energy and the chips they can actually afford

Open AI and it's ilk are obsessed with doing what first made them successful, harder, faster, bigger. For that, and to generate returns to match the debt and investment, and the resources that need, do not exist.

AI (LLMs to the cynical) will utterly revolutionise the world. The birth pangs are a huge bonfire of money and dud investments.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse