A massive capital deployment plan is taking shape at Nebius (NASDAQ: NBIS), with the AI infrastructure firm projecting $40 billion to $45 billion in capital expenditure for 2027.
The company says it has already secured commitments to cover between 75% and 85% of that spending, drawing on customer prepayments and anticipated asset-based financing arrangements.
Chief Revenue Officer Marc Boroditsky explained the funding structure in an interview with Yahoo Finance’s Deirdre Bosa, noting the two primary sources underpinning the coverage.
“We’ve got 75 to 85% of that CapEx covered,” Boroditsky said, adding that it comes “through both the prepayments that we are already anticipating, plus the expectation that there may be some degree of asset-based financing.”
The remaining gap leaves Nebius with flexibility to tap broader capital markets depending on conditions, with Boroditsky signaling the company is watching both debt and equity channels closely.
He noted that “if the debt markets get more reasonable or the equity markets make more sense, we may be raising financing that way,” suggesting no single path has been locked in.
The customer-funded model drew particular attention after Nebius reported in its third quarter that client prepayments exceeded 100% of CapEx during that period, an unusually strong result that highlighted demand for its infrastructure.
Despite beating revenue expectations in Q3, the company’s shares fell 9% following the earnings release, weighed down by a lowered 2026 revenue outlook and an upward revision to its capital spending forecast.
The stock was showing a decline of more than 12% in the session tracked by Yahoo Finance, reflecting investor concern over the gap between near-term guidance and longer-term spending ambitions.
Beyond the financing mechanics, Boroditsky pointed to a notable shift in how enterprise customers are thinking about where their AI workloads can be processed, driven by evolving geopolitical pressures.
He noted that customers who previously required their workloads to run exclusively within the United States are now reconsidering that position as geopolitical dynamics make that constraint harder to maintain.
Those same customers are now, according to Boroditsky, “opening themselves up to other locations that may be able to be just as suitable” and capable of delivering equivalent performance outcomes.
The shift could broaden Nebius’s addressable market geographically, potentially accelerating its ability to deploy capacity in markets outside the U.S. where regulatory or political conditions may be more predictable.
For a company staking its near-term future on one of the largest AI infrastructure buildouts among its peer group, how it manages the remaining 15% to 25% of unfunded 2027 CapEx will be a central question heading into 2027.
