FT: Google built a $200 billion Wall Street machine to bankroll Anthropic's chips
A Financial Times investigation details for the first time how Anthropic's $200 billion compute commitment to Google is actually being paid for: a web of interlocking contracts spanning Google, Broadcom, Apollo, Blackstone, Morgan Stanley and even former crypto miners. Because Anthropic has no credit rating, Google guarantees the data centres — a potential liability the FT puts at up to $44 billion — while Broadcom backstops the chips; a first $35 billion tranche has already bought roughly a million TPUs through a special-purpose vehicle that leases them back to Anthropic.
Why it mattersThe AI buildout is now financed like airports or power plants: debt, special-purpose vehicles and guarantees that spread the risk across Wall Street. That structure lets Google-backed projects borrow at about 7.1% while Nvidia-based operators pay closer to 9.3% — and it means an AI downturn would no longer stay inside the tech industry.
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