Nvidia Signs Up to $50 Billion Data Center Lease, Deploying Hundreds of Thousands of GPUs in Texas
Nvidia has signed a lease for Hut 8's Beacon Point campus in Texas, with a 1-gigawatt capacity and hundreds of thousands of its GPUs. The 15-year base lease is valued at $19.6 billion, with a potential 30-year total of $50.2 billion if all renewal options are exercised. Nvidia's credit default swap spread widened amid reports of large financing deals. The company's unpaid data center lease payments reached $32.4 billion in its latest quarter, up from $7.4 billion in the same period of 2025.
Nvidia has signed a data center lease agreement worth up to $50 billion, renting Hut 8's Beacon Point campus in Texas. The campus has a planned capacity of 1 gigawatt and will deploy hundreds of thousands of Nvidia graphics processing units, with power supply already secured. Hut 8 previously disclosed that the 15-year base lease is valued at $19.6 billion, and if all renewal options are exercised, the total value over 30 years could rise to $50.2 billion. At the time, Hut 8 did not disclose the tenant's identity, only describing it as an "existing investment-grade customer." People familiar with the matter confirmed that the tenant is Nvidia.
A Nvidia spokesperson said the company is working with ecosystem partners through the DSX AI factory architecture to accelerate the deployment of efficient AI infrastructure. DSX is Nvidia's full-stack AI factory architecture designed to help design, build, and operate large-scale AI data centers, combining the company's technology with partner equipment.
Nvidia's credit market signals have drawn attention. ICE Data Services data show that Nvidia's five-year credit default swap rose about 14 basis points intraday, reaching a high of about 82 basis points per year, the largest intraday increase since the contract began active trading in November 2025. This move came amid a flurry of reports on major financing deals, including Nvidia's cooperation with SK Hynix's parent company valued at over $500 billion, and Nvidia's negotiations to provide up to $250 billion in guarantees to OpenAI to help it lease U. S. data center computing capacity.
Critics have for months warned of the circular nature of these transactions: Nvidia provides financing or takes stakes in some companies, which in turn often buy or use Nvidia chips. Such financing often relies on investment-grade credit ratings to be viable, a threshold that cash-burning AI companies like OpenAI and Anthropic struggle to meet. The backing and support of large corporations are key to helping related AI infrastructure debt achieve higher ratings.
Nvidia's latest quarterly earnings show that the company's unpaid data center lease payments, primarily for research and development, reached $32.4 billion, compared with $7.4 billion in the same period of 2025. The $9.8 billion Beacon Point Phase 1 lease signed by the two parties in March accounts for nearly one-third of that total. Hut 8 announced on July 20 that the Beacon Point campus is fully commercially leased. The campus is designed according to Nvidia's DSX AI factory reference architecture, specifically built for gigawatt-scale AI infrastructure.