Rittenhouse Research
AI Infrastructure, Data Centers, Neoclouds, Software & Fintech Research
AI infrastructure operators such as Core Scientific, CoreWeave, Galaxy Digital and TeraWulf benefit if out-year gigawatt projections are not met. Constraints on power generation, grid transmission, labor and wafer capacity limit how many debt-financed data centers and chips get built, which is healthier longer term if the build-out is funded from operating cash flow. @LEJCapital counters that this assumes demand keeps growing exponentially and stays far above supply. x.com x.com
AI infrastructure operators aren't threatened by Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei's essay on limiting inputs to frontier models, such as training compute. No reasonable reader would conclude the labs intend to slow down; if anything, the essay explains why they won't, since China can't be trusted to keep any slowdown deal. @MF_Camillus adds that the essay says nothing new and that even heavier investment is needed. He sees the long-term effect as margins shifting from models to infrastructure. x.com x.com
Electricity is a clear bottleneck for AI, favoring AI-focused power and data-center infrastructure names over residential utilities. The US could be short 107 GW to power data centers through 2029, while China adds capacity year after year. Medium-term preferences are Cipher, Hut 8, Riot, TeraWulf, Galaxy, Equinix, Bloom Energy, Solaris, Vistra, GE Vernova, INIO, Williams, Liberty Energy, EROC and Cummins. x.com x.com
Meta's unmet AI demand pays its bottleneck suppliers. Super Micro's $19.5B quarterly outlook and under 8x forward earnings point to a double. CoreWeave's Meta deals total $35.2B; it should easily top $100. Builders say nearly all new sites use Dell or Super Micro; Dell could easily double. Micron's demand is off the charts at 5x forward earnings. Sources say Vertiv's gear is sold out for 2-3 years. VivoPower has 2GW+ potential in 5-7 years. Digi Power X has a $1.1B Cerebras deal. x.com x.com … Show more
AI data-center investment needs outside AI spending to rise 33-fold by 2030 to break even. Hyperscalers hold $4.5 trillion in debt and future liabilities, but corporate and SaaS token spending outside circular deals is only $60 billion annualized against a $2 trillion break-even ARR. SK hynix says memory shortages may last until 2031, raising capex and CoreWeave default risk; Mitsubishi warns turbines are booked through 2031 and cost 400% more, delaying CoreWeave and Oracle data centers. x.com … Show more
Contracted AI compute demand makes four AI infrastructure stocks worth buying at 52-week lows. Applied Digital has a $36B backlog and expects 600+ MW online within 12 months; Cipher Mining has $8.5B+ in AI leases with payments ramping; CleanSpark has a 20-year $6.6B lease and 1.8+ GW power portfolio; CoreWeave has a $104B backlog and raised its year-end ARR target to $18.5-19.5B. x.com x.com
Financing announcements point to more accelerator demand, supporting semiconductors. About $200bn in announced Meta, Anthropic/Broadcom and SpaceX/Nvidia financing likely drives $400bn in XPU purchases. Data centers burn cash until lit, then cash flow 20-40% annually; AI spend rising from 0.1% to 0.5-1% of current payroll could balance the buildout if agents replace roles. Sustainable token demand is the bet, but smaller local models are the bigger risk, though not an immediate concern. x.com … Show more
Global resistance to data centers could constrain December cloud growth despite the longer agentic AI buildout. Some estimates say roughly 120 US projects worth over $130B face delays; opposition spans the UK, EU, Australia and Malaysia too. Microsoft, Alphabet and Amazon remain favored, though guidance is at risk. CoreWeave, Nebius and IREN may bounce hardest short term but look weak longer term as funding tightens; Elon Musk expects extensive neo-cloud consolidation. x.com x.com x.com x.com
AI infrastructure need not repay the entire late-decade buildout by 2030 because buildings and GPUs have years of earning life left. On an accrual basis, estimated revenue needed through 2030 is $4.3-5.1T, not Gartner's $8.5T, versus its $3.6T ceiling for AI revenue tied to data centers. Oracle's and CoreWeave's booked contracts also challenge Gartner's market sizing. For Nebius and TeraWulf, capital remains a risk; Nebius also faces renewal pricing into the 2027-28 supply wave. x.com
AI data-center spending should reach chips first, then racks, power and cooling, benefiting Nvidia, AMD, Vertiv, Bloom Energy, Credo, Marvell, Lumentum and Micron. BofA forecasts the global data-center market at about $1T in 2026, $2.1T in 2028 and nearly $3T by 2030, a 37% annual rise; roughly 80% of a new AI site's $57M per MW cost goes to servers, networking and storage. x.com
Financing strain threatens smaller AI-related plays. Elon Musk says debt markets have nearly closed to firms without substantial non-AI-data-center revenue. Neoclouds, energy, HVAC, electronics and builders will be a much smaller field in a year; its 'guppy' plays can be shorted here toward zero. CoreWeave, IREN and Vertiv look troubled, perhaps Nebius; Ouster, Applied Digital, Ultra Clean, Cipher Digital, WhiteFiber, TeraWulf and IPG Photonics too. x.com x.com
SpaceX's AI-cloud ambitions face a severe two-sided constraint: finding 12 GW of Rubin capacity in one year looks implausible, and even that buildout would need customers willing to rent roughly $50B of compute annually. The scale of both the supply and demand challenges makes the plan highly skeptical. x.com
