Australian Dollar: Hawkish RBA fails to impress markets – ING

The main concerns focus on three major issues: management claims an annual price of $20-25 million per megawatt, while actual financial data shows only $9.2 million; independent calculations by two institutions both indicate a financing gap of about $33 billion; by 2028, the market will see an influx of 55 gigawatts of new computing power, 20 times CoreWeave’s own capacity. With current debt at $46.9 billion and equity only $4 billion, and no free cash flow within this decade—the question of whether its scarce performance can last until the loans are repaid is something even strong quarterly reports cannot answer.

Goldman Sachs analyst Bobby Molavi compared the current situation to the 19th-century British railway mania: 500 companies spent more than the nation's annual income building 8,000 miles of railway, with most early investors losing out, while the real beneficiaries were the later "passengers." He pointed out that the current AI craze is driven by both debt and momentum, and that the S&P 500’s forward P/E ratio of 18x is only "a bit cheaper." Whether the builders can retain value is uncertain, and history does not offer an optimistic answer.

The shrinking valuations of two major giants have triggered a chain reaction—investors are adopting more conservative revenue multiples for AI startups and are directly halting high-valuation financing for companies with zero revenue. Multiple venture capital firms have advised their portfolio companies to lower valuation expectations and to quickly build up cash reserves. Market participants warn that the outcome of Anthropic’s IPO will be a barometer for the industry: if successful, the boom will continue; if it fails, some companies may face elimination.