SAN FRANCISCO — Nvidia launched a financing initiative with six major asset managers, including BlackRock and Goldman Sachs, to mobilize more than $500 billion for AI infrastructure. The program aims to turn graphics processing units into an investable asset class, enabling companies to finance data center builds and hardware acquisition without tapping their own balance sheets.
Apollo Global Management, Blackstone, Brookfield Asset Management and KKR also joined the effort, Nvidia said. Their platforms are designed to underwrite AI compute capacity, treating it similarly to commercial real estate or toll roads.
CEO Jensen Huang said this marks the first time technology chips have become an investable asset. Speaking on CNBC, Huang said these assets are revenue-generating, productive, long-lived, fungible and flexible, and argued that Nvidia's hardware is broadly adopted and transferable across customers.
Huang compared computing to essential infrastructure like electricity and the internet, a framing that directly challenges the historical view of GPUs as rapidly depreciating hardware.
The financing structure targets hyperscalers, frontier AI labs and other enterprises, allowing them to secure funding for Nvidia hardware without burdening their balance sheets.
Wall Street has shown growing interest in digital infrastructure. Alternative asset managers are actively deploying institutional and insurance capital into such projects. Apollo and Blackstone have previously structured debt and equity financing for AI companies, including Anthropic.
The initiative follows a July market downturn in which investors questioned the profitability of large technology companies' AI investments. Moody's had warned that heavy capital expenditures were squeezing free cash flow and increasing debt loads for tech giants.
BlackRock CEO Larry Fink, Blackstone President Jon Gray and Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon expressed support for the initiative in a news release.
Some market participants remain concerned about whether AI chips can retain value as newer generations emerge. Huang addressed potential circular financing, saying the capital would come from independent, long-term institutional investors.
Nvidia shares dropped nearly 3 percent on Monday when the partnerships were announced, then rose 0.7 percent overnight. The stock was trading at $217.55, down 2.9 percent.
