Morgan Stanley is promoting $15 billion in leveraged loans to data center developers this year, replacing traditional bonds.

Behind this figure is a fundamental shift in AI computing power financing models—shifting from equity/bond financing to floating-rate leveraged loans.
Data centers are the physical foundation of AI and the key carriers for crypto miners transitioning to AI.
Leveraged loans target low-credit, high-leverage companies, meaning the providers of computing power will bear higher financing costs.
If AI revenue growth falls short of expectations, interest expenses will quickly erode profits and may even trigger chain defaults.
For the crypto market, the funding gap for miners transitioning to AI is already huge, and now traditional finance is intervening with higher risk, potentially intensifying volatility in the computing power market.
As data center financing costs rise, the pricing of AI inference services will also increase, ultimately passing through to applications relying on on-chain AI.
Reverse risk: If the scale of leveraged loans gets out of control, it could replay the 2022 crypto lending crisis—this time with data centers as the main players.
Floating rates are advantageous during rate-cutting cycles, but if inflation repeatedly keeps rates high, high-leverage projects will be the first to come under pressure.
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