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Google to pay SpaceX $920M a month for compute capacity at xAI data centers

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Re: Google to pay SpaceX $920M a month for compute capacity at xAI data centers

#611
I am really wondering if Google is just subleasing Anthropic capacity. The terms are suspiciously the same as Anthropic's and Anthropic was supposed to have leased out all of Colossus 1.

Maybe with the corp token spending limits and the rise of codex, Anthropic saw steep deceleration in usuage?

Re: Google to pay SpaceX $920M a month for compute capacity at xAI data centers

#612

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The value of the stock is your share in the underlying business. Because underlying business changes over time (hopefully for the better) you are not simply hoping another shmuck pays you more, like with tulips, whose underlying value does not change with time. You own a portion of a concern that is improving its own fortunes. Furthermore, dividends are approved by the board once per quarter or once per year. A divid…

> The value of the stock is your share in the underlying business. Which for most investors with Class C/D shares is... the square root of zero. They assert no control over the business, the only way to benefit from the stock is to find another shmuck to buy it at a higher price.

The price of a growing business should go up because it has more options to create returns for shareholders.

Use Aldi (revenue ~$120B) as an example. Do you think a person would be a shmuck to buy a slice of it now versus when revenue was $1 million? If not, why not? Your answer will help understand why stock has value even without voting control or dividends.

Re: Google to pay SpaceX $920M a month for compute capacity at xAI data centers

#613
post #300

This is a masterful piece of financial engineering by Google and SpaceX. Google purchased 10% of SpaceX over a decade ago. After dilution they probably own around 5%. SpaceX is valued at a whopping 94x revenue. This deal increases SpaceX's revenue by $11 billion per year. If SpaceX maintains this revenue multiplier, then this single deal boosts SpaceX's valuation by 94 x 11 billion = $1 trillion dollars. Google owns…

I sincerely hope the market is not willing to value this sort of deal at a P/E ratio anywhere near 94. Off the top of my head, there is a very well established business involving buying expensive things and leasing them to the companies that intend to operate them so they can sell services: aircraft leasing. AER is the biggest player and they have a P/E ratio of, drumroll please, 6. And I expect that GPUs, despite cu…

But growth rates could make that a bargain. If the market has taught us anything since 2009, it’s don’t underestimate growth

Re: Google to pay SpaceX $920M a month for compute capacity at xAI data centers

#614

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The value of the stock is your share in the underlying business. Because underlying business changes over time (hopefully for the better) you are not simply hoping another shmuck pays you more, like with tulips, whose underlying value does not change with time. You own a portion of a concern that is improving its own fortunes. Furthermore, dividends are approved by the board once per quarter or once per year. A divid…

That’s the story, but it’s bullshit. The underlying intrinsic value of a stock can only be materialized if the company liquidates and you receive a share of the sell off of its assets. How many publicly traded companies abruptly decide they’re tired of the business, stop in their tracks, and liquidate their assets? This only really happens if the company is acquired or if it goes bankrupt. Acquisition is the closest…

> The underlying intrinsic value of a stock can only be materialized if the company liquidates and you receive a share of the sell off of its assets.

This is wildly incorrect. A profitable company can decide to begin paying out dividends, which can eventually return > 100% of the investor's purchase price. A company can issue more stock or bonds to raise cash to pay investors. A company can spin off assets to raise cash to pay investors.

Your framing is very much like a short-term PE investor, and if you look to their playbooks you can see there are many ways for intrinsic value to be realized while leaving an operating business behind. There are any number of stories where PE investors make big profits and then turn around and resell the company for more than they paid.

Re: Google to pay SpaceX $920M a month for compute capacity at xAI data centers

#615
post #531
post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This sounds exactly like the kind of thing that will be outlawed in thirty years after tracing back the root cause of the second great depression.

Why was it not outlawed post dotcom crash? This was exactly the thing that led to the dotcom crash.

Maybe there wasn't enough damage, either economical, financial or societal?

Re: Google to pay SpaceX $920M a month for compute capacity at xAI data centers

#616
post #585

Earlier quoted context omitted.

US companies normally do stock buy-backs instead. It is a way to distribute the money to the investors, that their tax system favors.

There are lots of US companies that pay dividends. Another commentor lists some tech companies that do, and there are lots of other types of businesses that do. A quick internet search will give you a list. You are correct that stock buybacks are another way that companies reward their shareholders.

Good call. I should have said that most of those companies also do buybacks as part of their capital return strategies.

Re: Google to pay SpaceX $920M a month for compute capacity at xAI data centers

#617

How can SpaceX have so much GPU spare capacity? It doesn't make any sense. Did Musk blindly order humongous amounts of GPUs years ago before any of us had any sense of the scale this was going to reach?

Musk made big investments in building AI data centers starting in 2024, continuing through the present. SpaceX got those assets from xAI, spun off from X, via an acquisition. More details: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colossus_(supercomputer)

That wikipedia page mentions SpaceX reached a deal to lease all of Colossus 1 to Anthropic: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colossus_(supercomputer)#cite_...

So will SpaceX lease Colossus 2 to Google? If both Colossus datacenters are rented, will xAI have any compute?

Re: Google to pay SpaceX $920M a month for compute capacity at xAI data centers

#618
post #273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If whole market means whole market, then such investments are exposed to companies who are fairly valued, companies who are massively overvalued, and companies who are massively undervalued, and the whole range in between. If you want to start picking and choosing which companies are overvalued and which are undervalued, don’t invest in whole market funds. But most people are not good at that!

the problem: The Nasdaq 100 and FTSE Russell made a rule change that allows SpaceX to enter index without mormal time for price discovery. Most index funds have rebalance day just 5 days after IPO. S&P also made rule change for S&P Total Market Index and Dow Jones US Total Stock Market Index, but left SP500 intact. Nothing wrong with SpaceX or Anthropic getting into indexes with fair rules, this rule change is pure c…

I mean these rule changes have been a long time coming. SpaceX was just the straw that broke the camels back here. These major index's want to stay relevant and cutting out some of the biggest companies in the market just opens the way for a "true" NASDAQ 100 that is actually market cap weighted rather then some arbitrary rules cutting somethings out.

Re: Google to pay SpaceX $920M a month for compute capacity at xAI data centers

#619

Earlier quoted context omitted.

SpaceX already has 10,000 satellites on orbit that are basically preview versions of space data centers. They've already paid 5 years of that 5-10 year timeline you outlined.

the math doesn't work. a starlink satellite has ~10kw power consumption. A single ai optimized server rack (GB300) is 140kw. Starlink works because you get a massive benefit from putting networking in space for rural users. no one has made a convincing case as to why putting a data center in space is a benefit that can come anywhere near the drawbacks (inability to service, launch cost, cooling etc)

> no one has made a convincing case as to why putting a data center in space is a benefit that can come anywhere near the drawbacks

Permitting. And the main drawback is cooling. If you want to sell a company to SpaceX, build a better radiator.

I’m not saying the math maths. But it isn’t fundamentally fucked in the way a lot of armchair commentary has been making it out to be.

Re: Google to pay SpaceX $920M a month for compute capacity at xAI data centers

#620

This is a masterful piece of financial engineering by Google and SpaceX. Google purchased 10% of SpaceX over a decade ago. After dilution they probably own around 5%. SpaceX is valued at a whopping 94x revenue. This deal increases SpaceX's revenue by $11 billion per year. If SpaceX maintains this revenue multiplier, then this single deal boosts SpaceX's valuation by 94 x 11 billion = $1 trillion dollars. Google owns…

> because of this deal, SpaceX is now profitable

This is a huge claim for which we have no evidence.

$920mm/month at 30% datacenter margins yields $3bn in gross profit. Less in net income. That doesn’t cover SpaceX’s losses.

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