BlackRock Seeks Over $12 Billion in Debt Financing for Texas AI Data Center
N.R. Finch
BlackRock plans to issue more than $12 billion in bonds to finance an AI data-center campus in El Paso, Texas — the latest sign that AI infrastructure costs are being packaged into fixed-income products and pushed out to bond investors.
How big is this deal and where does the money go?
The offering tops $12 billion, broadly in line with the roughly $13 billion figure sources disclosed in May.
Proceeds fund a data-center campus in El Paso, Texas, under the project name "Project Sopaipilla Holdings."
BlackRock has tapped JPMorgan and Morgan Stanley to run a fixed-income investor roadshow on Wednesday, with pricing expected early next week.
Who owns what in this structure?
The bonds are issued by an entity holding 80% of the project, jointly owned by BlackRock's GIP (Global Infrastructure Partners) and HPS Investment Partners.
Meta holds the remaining 20% — making it both an equity investor and a likely tenant of the facility.
This means → BlackRock is not borrowing on its own balance sheet. It wraps the project company into a bond issuer and lets the fixed-income market absorb the construction cost.
Has this financing model been used before?
Yes. Last year Meta and Blue Owl Capital closed a nearly $30 billion financing package for a rural Louisiana data center using an almost identical structure.
In plain terms = the playbook is the same: set up a project entity → have that entity issue bonds → convert massive build costs into fixed-income paper sold to bond investors.
This reflects a repeatable "project bond" template taking shape across AI infrastructure, with deal sizes still climbing.
Will fixed-income investors keep buying in?
Bloomberg notes that pricing power for these deals hinges on two variables: lease structure and credit-backing quality.
This means → investors are not betting on how hot AI is — they are underwriting who rents the building, for how long, and who stands behind the payments.
BlackRock, JPMorgan, and Morgan Stanley all declined to comment; Meta did not immediately respond — standard silence while a deal is still in its pricing window.
Content is for reference only, not financial advice.