Blackstone

The dominoes are falling

Breaking: Blackstone just restricted withdrawals from its $77 billion private credit fund for the second consecutive quarter

They have only returned 50% of investors request

Companies capping withdrawals:

• Blackstone

• Blue Owl Capital

• Apollo Management

• Ares Management

• BlackRock

• Starwood Capital

📢 𝗝𝗨𝗦𝗧 𝗜𝗡: Databricks Raises $5 Billion at $190 Billion Valuation as AI Revenue Surges

👉 𝗞𝗲𝘆 𝗛𝗶𝗴𝗵𝗹𝗶𝗴𝗵𝘁𝘀:

➤ 𝗗𝗮𝘁𝗮𝗯𝗿𝗶𝗰𝗸𝘀 raises $𝟱 𝗯𝗶𝗹𝗹𝗶𝗼𝗻 at a $𝟭𝟵𝟬 𝗯𝗶𝗹𝗹𝗶𝗼𝗻 post-money valuation.

➤ Revenue run rate surpassed $𝟳 𝗯𝗶𝗹𝗹𝗶𝗼𝗻, growing more than 𝟴𝟬% year-over-year.

➤ 𝗖𝗼𝗮𝘁𝘂𝗲 led the financing alongside Blackstone, MGX and T. Rowe Price.

➤ 𝗦𝗶𝘅𝘁𝗵 𝗦𝘁𝗿𝗲𝗲𝘁 𝗚𝗿𝗼𝘄𝘁𝗵 joined the round as a new investor.

➤ 𝗟𝗮𝗸𝗲𝗯𝗮𝘀𝗲 surpassed a $𝟭𝟬𝟬 𝗺𝗶𝗹𝗹𝗶𝗼𝗻 revenue run rate.

➤ Funding targets 𝗨𝗻𝗶𝘁𝘆 𝗔𝗜 𝗚𝗮𝘁𝗲𝘄𝗮𝘆, Lakebase and Genie expansion.

➤ 𝗨𝗻𝗶𝘁𝘆 𝗔𝗜 𝗚𝗮𝘁𝗲𝘄𝗮𝘆 helps enterprises route models and control token spending.

➤ CEO 𝗔𝗹𝗶 𝗚𝗵𝗼𝗱𝘀𝗶 argues AGI has arrived under pre-2022 definitions.

➤ Ghodsi identifies 𝗲𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗿𝗽𝗿𝗶𝘀𝗲 𝗰𝗼𝗻𝘁𝗲𝘅𝘁 as a major barrier to AI autonomy.

👉 𝗪𝗵𝘆 𝗧𝗵𝗶𝘀 𝗠𝗮𝘁𝘁𝗲𝗿𝘀:

➤ The $𝟭𝟵𝟬 𝗯𝗶𝗹𝗹𝗶𝗼𝗻 valuation signals strong investor confidence in enterprise AI.

➤ Rapid revenue growth suggests enterprises continue expanding 𝗔𝗜 𝗶𝗻𝗳𝗿𝗮𝘀𝘁𝗿𝘂𝗰𝘁𝘂𝗿𝗲 spending.

➤ Databricks is positioning itself as a governance layer across 𝗺𝘂𝗹𝘁𝗶-𝗺𝗼𝗱𝗲𝗹 AI ecosystems.

➤ Enterprise AI returns remain critical to sustaining long-term spending and valuations.

👉 𝗘𝘅𝗽𝗲𝗿𝘁 𝗦𝘁𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁𝘀:

𝗔𝗹𝗶 𝗚𝗵𝗼𝗱𝘀𝗶, Cofounder and CEO of Databricks:

"There's a huge amount of interest in some of our AI technologies, especially since the token-maxing phenomenon has gone crazy," Ghodsi told me in an exclusive interview. "Unity AI Gateway lets you route all of your tokens through one system and set budgets for different groups or individuals. That gives companies a way to control their token spending and avoid simply maxing out tokens. We call it switching from token maxing to value maxing."

𝗔𝗹𝗶 𝗚𝗵𝗼𝗱𝘀𝗶, Cofounder and CEO of Databricks:

"Instead of being locked into a single harness, they can move between them, control how those agents operate and manage the costs across them," Ghodsi says. "This is one of our three major bets."

𝗢𝘄𝗲𝗻 𝗟𝗮𝘂, Equity Analyst at Clear Street:

"ARR growing at 50%+ and gross margin stabilizing at 70%+ over the next few years should justify the valuation," says Owen Lau, equity analyst at Clear Street. "The ROI debate at the application layer is still not settled. If the enterprises can't monetize these AI tools or increase productivity, they will likely cut back these data and AI investments."

𝗔𝗹𝗶 𝗚𝗵𝗼𝗱𝘀𝗶, Cofounder and CEO of Databricks:

"If that is your definition, then of course it is not here," he says. "It is also unclear whether what the industry is currently building will ever become that."

𝗔𝗹𝗶 𝗚𝗵𝗼𝗱𝘀𝗶, Cofounder and CEO of Databricks:

"the world remains largely unchanged, except that token spending is rising. There is a major gap between the intelligence AI possesses and the impact it is having."

BofA: Nvidia's $500B Financing

> NVDA Underwrites Value, Not Debt: NVDA has signed Memorandums of Understanding (MOUs) with six top financiers (Apollo, BlackRock, Blackstone, Brookfield, Goldman Sachs, and KKR) to mobilize over $500 billion in third-party capital via independent platforms. The financial burden sits with the consortium rather than NVDA's balance sheet.

> GPUs as an Investable Asset Class: With $500 billion of capital treating compute as an investable asset class, residual values must hold. NVDA supplies fungible and transferable compute across operators, and CUDA extends its useful life to keep resell/rental rates high and depreciation curves benign.

> Extending the AI Buildout Runway: Funding—rather than demand—has been the primary bottleneck. A $500 billion pool allows non-investment-grade buyers (such as labs, neoclouds, and sovereigns) to secure hardware at attractive rates, de-risking offtake and supporting long-term AI systems Total Addressable Market (TAM) paths.

> Key Debates and Risks Monitored: Notable cautions remain, including the fact that MOUs are not deployed capital (requiring real end-customers paying real money), potential power and regulatory pushback, input-cost inflation, and the opacity/complexity that new financing structures might introduce to AI buildouts.

FINANCIAL TIMES:

- Nvidia is partnering with Apollo, Blackstone, Goldman Sachs and others on a massive $500B AI Financing Deal.

- Deal could be announced as soon as today

$NVIDIA(NVDA.US) $Goldman Sachs(GS.US) $Apollo Global(APO.US) $Blackstone(BX.US)

looks like some more money is getting ready to help build out these datacenters

Source: amit