SpaceX seeks $40B for Nvidia GPUs, more than its $38.4B total debt
SpaceX is in talks to borrow about $40 billion to buy Nvidia GPUs, and the company’s own quarterly filing shows that single deal would be bigger than every dollar it currently owes. The Form 10-Q SpaceX filed on August 4 puts total debt principal at $38.4 billion as of June 30, 2026. It also shows $13.4 billion of that sitting in a line the footnote ties to AI hardware, a figure neither CNBC, Semafor nor Reuters mentioned.
CNBC reported on Wednesday that Apollo and several banks are in discussions to help facilitate the purchase, citing a person familiar with the talks. A Reuters account of the Financial Times report breaks the structure into roughly $10 billion of bank loans and $30 billion of investment-grade debt, with Pimco among a small group of lenders in talks. CNBC’s own summary is blunt about how early this is: discussions are preliminary and details have yet to be finalized, including key lenders.
CNBC’s source said the deal would likely use the GPUs as collateral. That is the detail worth sitting with, because the bonds SpaceX sold in June carry no collateral at all.
SpaceX Notes are unsecured obligations of the Company and rank equally in right of payment with all existing and future unsubordinated indebtedness, liabilities, and other obligations of the Company.
Space Exploration Technologies Corp, Form 10-Q for the quarter ended June 30, 2026
What the June bond sale actually bought
Those notes are the $25 billion raise CNBC refers to, and the pricing 8-K lists five tranches. But their proceeds didn’t buy chips. The filing says they repaid a $20 billion unsecured bridge loan taken out in March 2026 in full, with the remainder going to general corporate purposes.
| Tranche | Size | Coupon | Maturity |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2031 Notes | $7.0B | 5.350% | 15 July 2031 |
| 2033 Notes | $6.0B | 5.650% | 15 July 2033 |
| 2036 Notes | $6.0B | 5.875% | 15 July 2036 |
| 2046 Notes | $2.5B | 6.600% | 15 July 2046 |
| 2056 Notes | $3.5B | 6.650% | 15 July 2056 |
That maturity profile sits awkwardly against the collateral logic, though. CNBC’s credit industry source said the market still assumes GPUs hold their value for about seven years. But the longest June tranche runs to 2056.
Still, the filing undercuts the idea that pledging chips would be new for SpaceX. Of the $38.4 billion of debt principal, $13.4 billion sits under a line called other financings, which the footnote says includes obligations related to certain AI infrastructure assets recorded as failed sale-leaseback transactions. In plain terms, SpaceX moved AI hardware to a counterparty and leased it back, and the accounting treats the cash as borrowing rather than a sale. A further $3.9 billion of equipment purchases were financed by other financings in the first half of 2026.
Why borrow with $100 billion in the bank
SpaceX held $93.5 billion of cash and $6.5 billion of short-term marketable securities at June 30, about $100 billion between them by our arithmetic. So the answer to why it needs lenders sits in the segment tables, which split the spending by business. AI capital expenditure ran to $23.6 billion in the first half of 2026, against group revenue of $12.5 billion and a net loss of $4.8 billion.
There’s a nearer claim on the cash too. The filing lists $28.0 billion of non-cancelable contractual commitments, mostly AI infrastructure and third-party cloud capacity, and $22.2 billion of that falls due in 2027. That’s the same year the Reuters account expects the chip financing to close.
Semafor’s read is that SpaceX sits between the mature giants and the private labs, with a BBB rating two notches below Meta and Alphabet and a stock that has gone sideways since the June listing. That’s where Apollo’s asset-backed finance strategy comes in. Worth noting on the name, because the two reports differ: Apollo’s own site calls the firm Apollo Global Management, as Reuters does, while CNBC calls it Apollo Capital Management.
None of this is settled, which means the lender list is the thing to watch. We’ve tracked the same financing squeeze from the vendor side, where Nvidia guaranteed $105B of OpenAI leases and then flagged its own $33.5B debt as a risk factor. But SpaceX reached this point faster than most, helped by the record June IPO that Reuters sizes at $86 billion. Its shares fell about 1% in extended trading after the report, while Nvidia’s rose 0.5%.
Get the daily rundown
One email each weekday with the AI news that matters, every claim linked to its primary source.
Free, one email each weekday, unsubscribe in one click. We never sell or share your address.
