Nvidia's $750 Billion AI Chip Financing Deals Signal a New Circular Market

Nvidia has moved beyond selling AI chips to actively financing customers, investing in projects, and co‑building data‑center infrastructure that will ultimately use its processors. Bloomberg reports the company is negotiating deals surpassing $750 billion, including a partnership with South Korea’s SK Group valued at over $500 billion and financing guarantees of up to $250 billion to help OpenAI lease computing power for large U.S. data‑center projects. Nvidia is also discussing funding chip purchases worth $350 billion for the same initiative, creating a "circular economy" where it finances, supplies, and later profits from the hardware it helped fund.

Analysts caution that this model may inflate demand while tying the financial health of AI firms to Nvidia’s own financing activities, raising questions about sustainability and systemic risk if AI spending slows. Similar financing structures are emerging elsewhere, as Google has provided guarantees for Anthropic’s data‑center leases amounting to about $35 billion.