Meta and BlackRock Form Joint Venture for $14 Billion Data Center Campus

Meta and BlackRock, the world's largest asset manager, announced a joint venture to develop and operate a data center campus in El Paso, Texas, with development costs of about $14 billion. BlackRock-managed funds will hold 80% of the joint venture's equity, while Meta retains the remaining 20%. Meta will contribute about $2.3 billion in land and construction-in-progress assets, and BlackRock will contribute about $4.9 billion in cash. To match the equity structure, Meta will receive a one-time cash distribution of about $1 billion.

BlackRock issued $12.5 billion in bonds through a special-purpose vehicle to partially fund the project. The bonds, issued by BlackRock affiliate Sopaipilla Investor, mature in 2048 and are priced at 2.875 percentage points above the yield on comparable U. S. Treasury notes. Morgan Stanley and JPMorgan served as financial advisors to Meta on the transaction.

The project is one of 28 data centers Meta operates or is building in the United States. Meta previously stated it plans to invest a cumulative $600 billion in data centers by 2028 to advance artificial intelligence research and development.

Meta will enter into a lease agreement with the joint venture for the entire data center campus, with an initial term of four years and four renewal options, extending up to 20 years. Meta will provide a residual value guarantee with a total cap of about $13 billion, which decreases over time. Since 2026, Meta's stock price has fallen by about 10%. The company plans to report second-quarter results on July 29.