Wall Street banks launch record $60bn chip deal for Broadcom and Anthropic

Bank of America, Citigroup and Morgan Stanley, which have committed to fund it, began on Monday offloading part of a new $60bn debt package that will fund Anthropic’s lease of Google semiconductors — described as the largest chip-financing deal to date. The package is guaranteed by Broadcom (partially backstopped to lower Anthropic’s borrowing costs) and is treated as a bellwether for appetite for AI debt at a time when investors have been demanding a higher risk premium to lend to tech companies pouring trillions into AI, on fears the capex may not become profitable; much of the borrowing funds ever more expensive chips. Structure: about $42bn of Broadcom-supported senior secured loans entered bank syndication on Monday and, given Broadcom’s A-minus rating, could later be sold more widely via a private placement or the investment-grade bond market; a further $18bn of junior debt without Broadcom guarantees is expected later from the same banks, with Blackstone committed to about $9bn of it and participating in syndication of the rest. Proceeds are earmarked for Anthropic’s 2027 chip orders, and lease payments begin only after delivery. Because the junior tranche carries Anthropic credit risk, one person said banks might prefer to wait until after Anthropic’s IPO later this year, when financial disclosures are available. Broadcom’s latest quarterly report says Anthropic could also issue up to $42bn of convertible notes to Broadcom to pay the leases. It follows Broadcom’s roughly $35bn deal with Apollo and Blackstone a few months ago alongside its 20-gigawatt “AI XPV” platform; Broadcom is developing TPUs with Google to counter Nvidia. Caveats: details come from people familiar with the matter; the banks and Blackstone declined to comment, and Bloomberg had earlier reported some aspects.