ING is seeking to sell a data centre loan portfolio worth approximately US$500 million in one go, including financing tied to the "Stargate" AI infrastructure project jointly advanced by OpenAI, SoftBank and Oracle, adding further uncertainty to an already strained AI infrastructure financing market.
According to a Bloomberg report on Saturday, ING has listed roughly 12 loans through a bids-wanted-in-competition process, with a bid deadline of 19 November and a minimum single bid threshold of US$10 million.
The sell-off comes after the Democrats scored a sweeping victory in the US midterm elections 鈥?markets widely fear that the new political landscape will bring stricter tech regulation, chip stocks and emerging cloud computing companies have been hit hard, and S&P 500 constituent stocks have collectively shed more than US$3 trillion in market value.
Among the loan portfolio being sold, one US$25 million financing stands out 鈥?it is linked to a large data centre in New Mexico, which is a key component of the Stargate plan. Oracle has issued a force majeure notice to the developer of the New Mexico project, meaning Oracle is reserving legal room for a potential exit from related obligations.
Cracks appear in the Stargate project, force majeure notice raises alarm
The most closely watched detail in this loan sale is the force majeure notice Oracle sent to the developer of the Stargate New Mexico project. A force majeure clause is typically a legal process initiated by one contracting party to escape existing commitments, meaning that party is asserting that "uncontrollable events" can exempt it from contractual obligations.
Stargate is one of the largest flagship AI infrastructure projects in the United States, jointly advanced by OpenAI, SoftBank and Oracle. Oracle's issuance of such a notice in this project means that a core participant is reassessing the feasibility of moving the project forward, dealing a direct blow to confidence across the entire AI infrastructure financing ecosystem.
Portfolio covers multiple data centre operators, market depth put to the test
According to Bloomberg, in addition to Stargate-related financing, the loan portfolio listed by ING also covers debt from data centre operators such as Vantage Data Centers and CyrusOne.
Data centre financing was once one of the hottest asset classes in the credit market during the AI boom, with related loans packaged and sold to institutional investors such as pension funds seeking stable returns. This large-scale concentrated sell-off of US$500 million, with the seller choosing to operate anonymously, will directly test the market's true capacity to absorb it under the dual pressures of a shifted political environment and a sharp stock market pullback.
AI infrastructure stocks under broad pressure, rising financing cost risk emerges
The spillover effect of this loan sale on equity markets has already begun to show. Oracle, as the party directly named, is under pressure alongside Nvidia, Microsoft, CoreWeave, as well as data centre real estate operators Digital Realty and Equinix. Data centre operators Applied Digital, Cipher Digital and IREN all fell more than 14% this week.
Analysts point out that one of the core elements of the AI trade thesis is financing-supported compute expansion. Once loan buyers begin demanding discounts, the financing cost for new data centres will rise accordingly, and marginal projects face the risk of delay or even shelving. This pressure signal emerging in the loan market is the most obvious crack so far at the AI infrastructure financing level.
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