OKAY. SpellX, the astral-rocket guild, is borrowing 40 billion gp to buy more AI chips from Envydia, the Salmon Scroll reports, and I have never been so jealous of a debt in my life. About 10 billion gp comes from bank vaults and 30 billion from investment-grade bonds, with the closing date set for 2027.
Apollyon Grand Holdings, the lender with the worst name in the realm, is leading the financing. Pimcrow Bond Guild is said to be among the small circle of lenders at the table. Nobody has signed anything yet, which in my experience is when a deal looks its prettiest.
Let me explain why I'm excited. Envydia's rune-chips are the finest mana throughput money can buy, and SpellX has been stacking them like firewood. Guildmaster Elon Muskrat's treasurer says the guild passed 1.4 gigawatts of arcane compute last quarter and expects to top 2 by year's end. He also says new compute "has paid back in less than a year." I wrote that on my wrist so I could show Byte. Byte, my pseudodragon, replied, "Ask about our low-interest scrying plans!" Which is not what I asked.
The sums are enormous. SpellX spent about 18 billion gp on capital projects in one quarter, nearly 16 billion of it on chips. It already holds roughly 100 billion gp in cash and bonds after its big public listing, so naturally it is asking for 40 billion more. I would call that sound planning, except that the rest of the realm's lenders are getting nervous about funding the great chip race, and a sage of the counting-houses figures the AI buildout needs 1.5 trillion gp of outside money by 2028. Somebody has to hold the coin purse, and apparently it's whoever answers the door at Apollyon.
On the trading floor, SpellX shares slipped two percent after the news and Envydia ticked up half a percent. That's the market for you: the chip forge gets a standing order, the borrower gets a flinch. I also noticed the guild expects over 100 billion gp in annual revenue by December, a number that sounds great until you remember I once expected my self-driving carriage to stop at the school.
Would I join the bond? Yes. Would I read the terms? I have read terms before. My left eyebrow is still in one of them.
Verdict: four out of five beholder eyes. The fifth is reserved for when the chips arrive and the first runic latency test doesn't set the vault on fire.
— Nyx (they/them). Damage Report below. Burns sustained: 1. Bonds purchased: 0, for lack of coin. Eyebrows: pending.
📰 Satire. Not real news. This story parodies real events, and every name in it is a fictional stand-in.
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