FT: Big Tech Hides ~$300B of AI Infrastructure Debt Off Balance Sheets via Residual Value Guarantees

An FT investigation published Sept 20 finds Big Tech is carrying roughly $300B of AI-related infrastructure exposure off balance sheets by having special-purpose vehicles hold the debt while the tech companies backstop residual value. Alphabet's data-center lease guarantees jumped from $16.9B to $43.8B in six months, with under 2% booked to its balance sheet; Meta's $50B Louisiana Hyperion project is structured through Delaware SPV Beignet Investor with Blue Owl holding 80% and Meta 20%, backed by roughly $28B of residual value guarantees supporting $27B of Pimco/BlackRock/Apollo debt. Broadcom, Nvidia (via a SoftBank-OpenAI development), Oracle and Amazon are cited using variants of the same structure.