Turmoil hits AI build-out as neoclouds face pressure, credit risks mount and Solidigm pulls IPO

Neoclouds tanked. Credit default swaps soared. Meta turned cash flow negative. And SK Hynix's Solidigm unit canceled plans for its initial public offering.

It's been a rocky week for the AI infrastructure trade.

The Nasdaq followed Thursday's beating with an additional drop on Friday to end the week down 0.7%. Among the hyperscalers, the worst performer was Alphabet, shares of which sank 6% ahead of the internet giant's third-quarter earnings report next week. Microsoft and Amazon are also on the docket, and they each saw shares fall less than 1%.

While the tech market has thus far avoided a dramatic across-the-board sell-off, the artificial intelligence build-out is showing signs of strain.

Shares of neoclouds CoreWeave, Nebius and IREN all fell sharply this week, bringing their losses for October to well over 30% each. CoreWeave, the leader of the pack, has seen spreads on its CDS widen past 11%, generally viewed as a distress level, as investors have to pay up for protection against default.

Meanwhile, yields on the company's 2031 and 2032 unsecured notes topped 15%.

"What investors are doing is throwing every baby out with the bathwater and saying anyone who is a neocloud" will be devalued, Roundhill Investments CEO Dave Mazza told CNBC's "Squawk on the Street" on Thursday.

Fears aren't limited to the U.S. market. Shares of Elice Group, a South Korean cloud provider, dropped 30% in their market debut on Tuesday, and shares of Australia's NextDC plunged 39.5% on Wednesday after the data center operator slashed its annual earnings forecast.

AI optimism has been the major market driver for the past couple of years, as unrelenting demand for new models and services pushes the world's biggest tech companies to spend on infrastructure at historic rates. However, skeptics are getting more vocal in their concerns that returns on AI investment won't justify the capital expenditures.

Analysts at research and advisory firm Gartner predict that 80% of neocloud companies will either cease operations or be absorbed by 2030.

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, perhaps the leading AI evangelist remains bullish. Huang said this week at a company conference in Berlin that "demand for the neoclouds is off the charts."

"The demand of the capital is much greater than the availability of the capital," Huang told CNBC's Arjun Kharpal. "That's going to get solved."

Withdrawn IPO

Wall Street isn't convinced. On Thursday, South Korean memory giant SK Hynix, one of the biggest winners in the AI boom, said it's pulling an IPO for its U.S.-based Solidigm unit, citing market volatility. SK Hynix purchased Solidigm, which makes NAND and SSD storage for data centers, from Intel in 2021.

"While an IPO was expected to ease investment burdens and expand capacity for shareholder returns, the review has been discontinued in light of market conditions and share price trends," SK Hynix said in a release.** **

Despite the turmoil, all of tech's mega-caps have maintained their investment-grade rating even as they've opened their wallets to fuel their build-outs, including through debt. Even with that group of companies, the market is showing some jitters.

Meta saw its stock plunge 7% on Thursday after the company reported negative free cash flow in the third quarter of over $2 billion while raising the floor of its full-year capex to $135 billion from $130 billion. Meta also said it plans to spend about $825 billion over the coming years on various leases and contracts, with over $450 billion of those leases being non-cancellable take-or-pay agreements.

Spreads on Meta's five-year CDS reached all-time highs of over 124 basis points. CDS on Nvidia and Oracle also touched records, with their spreads hitting 126 basis points and 343 basis points, respectively, this week. Oracle's stock has lost over one-third of its value this year, and now the company faces risks of a credit rating downgrade.

John Williams, who leads the derivatives practice at law firm Milbank LLP, says investors are seeking numerous ways beyond buying CDS to hedge their bets with respect to the AI trade.

"There's so much investment going into it that it's just very appropriate to look for risk management tools, completely regardless of whether you're bullish or bearish," Williams said. "It would be crazy for people not to be looking for appropriate risk management tools for it."

Brian Stutland, portfolio manager at Equity Armor Investments, told CNBC's "SquawkBox Asia" last week that it's "all kind of tied together," referring to AI's impact on the whole market.

"Can you drop a bowling ball in one part of the pool and not get any waves downstream to the rest of the Nasdaq?" he said. "I don't know. I have some concern about that."

— CNBC's Katie Tarasov contributed to this report

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