Crusoe CEO Chase Lochmiller calls neocloud stock selloff excessive
He also praised competitor CoreWeave, noting it had secured "some very good deals" and was "in a pretty good position," despite the turmoil surrounding it
Published
CoreWeave has become a focal point for worries about whether the AI infrastructure build-out, fueled by hundreds of billions in borrowed money, can hold up. Its bonds fell to distressed levels this month, and its stock has dropped over 30%.
Crusoe, established in 2018, built its name constructing large data center facilities, including the main site for the OpenAI and Oracle Stargate project in Texas. Beyond construction, the company has expanded into selling AI cloud computing power, placing it among a growing group of neoclouds, CoreWeave included, catering to surging enterprise demand for AI resources.
Just last month, Crusoe closed a funding round exceeding $3 billion, pushing its valuation to about $30 billion. Backers include major names like Nvidia Corp. and Salesforce Inc.
Despite that capital infusion, people familiar with the matter say some tech firms have expressed doubts about Crusoe's capacity to reliably launch and maintain its large, resource-heavy data centers. The company hit a snag earlier this year in Abilene, Texas, when Oracle and OpenAI opted against leasing additional space from Crusoe there. Microsoft Corp. later stepped in to take that capacity instead.
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Why it matters
A competing CEO calling the CoreWeave selloff overdone adds to a chorus that already includes Huang's repeated defenses of the company's financial health, yet none of that commentary has moved credit markets, where five-year CDS remain elevated even after narrowing to 1,041.4 bps and the 2031 bonds still trade at distressed levels (Oct 15 17:51, Oct 27 09:50). Lochmiller's praise for CoreWeave's deal-making, paired with reporting that some tech firms doubt Crusoe's own execution on large sites after losing the Abilene expansion to Microsoft, cuts both ways: it reads as a competitor defending the neocloud model broadly while implicitly acknowledging the sector's reliability questions extend beyond just CoreWeave. The gap between equity-side reassurance and bond-market stress that has defined CoreWeave's October remains unresolved by this comment.