CoreWeave stock and bonds are heading for steep weekly losses on AI debt worries

CoreWeave's shares and bonds prepared for sharp weekly declines on Friday, reflecting investor concerns over the AI-focused cloud computing firm's $50 billion debt burden, which has spread throughout the AI sector. The company gained attention this week due to recent inflation data fueling speculation on interest rate hikes, increasing the risk of higher borrowing costs for data center and AI infrastructure companies with significant debt.

Shares of CoreWeave plummeted over 6% in early trading, after falling more than 15% this week, marking their worst weekly performance in nearly two months. Analysts from BCA Research attributed the heavy selling to the company's highly leveraged business model, which relies heavily on future data center demand. While other sections of the tech industry are also vulnerable to the pace and intensity of AI adoption, they are generally less impacted by interest rates, according to the analysts.

The decline in CoreWeave's stock value has amounted to nearly 9.6 billion dollars this month. The yield on the company's October 2031 maturity dollar bond peaked above 16% on Thursday before falling for the fifth consecutive week, down about 3 cents on the dollar. Investor apprehension over CoreWeave's substantial debt load and distressed bond yields has had a ripple effect, causing Nebius Group's shares to tumble for their largest weekly loss in two months.

However, some analysts remain optimistic, maintaining an "outperform" rating on CoreWeave stock and emphasizing that the business model has not failed, rather the market has priced in a higher secondary-market bond yield.