What are Nvidia's guarantees and investments in its own customers?
Nvidia has about $35.5 billion of firm cash commitments to customers and related builders, led by $30 billion for OpenAI. Its largest contingent exposure is a guarantee capped at $105 billion on OpenAI's leased Ohio campus, which Nvidia pays only if OpenAI defaults and re-letting the site falls short.
The $35.5 billion is our sum of the firm cash rows below. Filing figures are as of July 26, 2026, the latest Nvidia has reported. Data as of 2026-11-05.
Nvidia's main commitments to customers
| Counterparty | What | Amount | Firm? | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| OpenAI | Equity in the 2026 round; amount paid not disclosed | $30B | Firm | OpenAI, 2026-02-27 |
| CoreWeave | Stock purchase | $2B | Firm | NVIDIA Newsroom, 2026-01-26 |
| Nebius | Pre-funded warrants | $2B | Firm | The Next Web, 2026-03-12 |
| SB Energy | Equity in the builder of OpenAI's Ohio campus | $1.5B | Firm | NVIDIA (SEC filing), 2026-08-17 |
| Anthropic | Equity | Up to $10B | Conditional | NVIDIA blog, 2025-11-18 |
| xAI | Equity in a chip financing, as reported | Up to $2B | Reported | Tom's Hardware, 2025-10-08 |
| OpenAI's Ohio landlord | Lease-value guarantee on about 4.25 GW | Up to $105B | Contingent | NVIDIA (SEC filing), 2026-08-17 |
| CoreWeave | Must buy unsold capacity through April 2032 | $6.3B | Contract | CoreWeave / SEC EDGAR, 2025-09-15 |
| AI cloud partners | Land, power and shell guarantees; partners escrowed $712M | $3.5B | Contingent | NVIDIA (SEC filing), 2026-08-26 |
SB Energy and the Ohio landlord are tied to OpenAI's campus and are not direct chip buyers. Nvidia is the campus's exclusive AI compute supplier. NVIDIA (SEC filing), 2026-08-17
How the $105 billion guarantee works
It is a cap, not a payment. Nvidia pays only if OpenAI defaults or becomes insolvent and re-letting or selling the site recovers less than a guaranteed minimum value. The leases run 20 years, with capacity from 2028. OpenAI must reimburse Nvidia, and Nvidia may choose to back about 3.8 GW more. NVIDIA (SEC filing), 2026-08-17
How much of Nvidia's results depend on its stakes
Nvidia added $31 billion of private-company stakes in the first half of fiscal 2027. NVIDIA (SEC filing), 2026-08-26 Those holdings stood at $51.2 billion on July 26, 2026, on top of $42.8 billion of listed stakes: about $94 billion, against $56.6 billion of cash and marketable debt (our arithmetic). NVIDIA (SEC filing), 2026-08-26 Paper gains on stakes were $23.7 billion of its $118 billion first-half net income, about 20 percent. Many of the stakes are in customers. NVIDIA (SEC filing), 2026-08-26 NVIDIA (SEC filing), 2026-08-26 First-half free cash flow was $69.9 billion, while buybacks, dividends and new private stakes came to $76.3 billion (our arithmetic). NVIDIA (SEC filing), 2026-08-26 NVIDIA (SEC filing), 2026-08-26
What is not firm
Reports describe a web of more than $750 billion of Nvidia financing talks, including a possible guarantee of up to $250 billion on an OpenAI data center and about $350 billion of chip financing. These are negotiations and up-to amounts, and we could not confirm them against the original reporting. Startup Fortune (citing Bloomberg, WSJ), 2026-07-27 The status of the September 2025 letter of intent for up to $100 billion in OpenAI is unclear. We leave both out of the totals above.
Our read
This section is our judgment, kept separate from the sourced record above.
Nvidia can afford this. The concern is what the commitments do to the signal in its numbers: when a supplier funds and guarantees its buyers, strong demand is harder to read from the outside.
The guarantee also changes who bears the risk of OpenAI. Nvidia used to be exposed mainly through lost chip sales. From 2028 it is also exposed to a shortfall in the value of the buildings.
What would change this answer
- Nvidia's next quarterly report and filing, due in mid-November 2026
- Whether it backs the further 3.8 GW
- Whether any of the reported talks become signed commitments