Lawmakers flag financial risks in AI buildout but rule out bailouts

Washington sees danger in the debt financing the AI data center boom, but it has no plans to catch anyone who falls

by Diego Almada Lopez

Thu 8 Oct 2026 · 07:03 EDT 2 min read

In AI

Oracle Corporation (ORCL) price

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Last close: $131
Close-to-close change: +3.5%
Market cap: $394.7B (shares as of 2026-09-07)
P/E (trailing): 20.5 (EPS to 2026-08-31)
Annual revenue: $67.4B USD (FY ended 2026-05-31) 10-K
Annual revenue growth: +17.3% (FY ended 2026-05-31 vs FY ended 2025-05-31) 10-K
Annual net income: 17,087,000,000 USD (FY ended 2026-05-31, attributable to the company) 10-K
Annual operating margin: 30.6% (FY ended 2026-05-31)
Forward P/E: Unavailable: no dated forecast source

Gloria daily close for session Oct 27, 2026. Market cap and trailing P/E use this close with the SEC share total and trailing diluted earnings, each dated next to its figure. Annual revenue, revenue growth, net income and margin show their own fiscal period and link the 10-K. Current context may postdate this article.

Oracle Corporation and its peers

Company	Price	Market cap	P/E (trailing)	Forward P/E	Annual revenue (USD)	Annual revenue growth	Annual net income (USD)	Operating margin
Oracle Corporation ORCL · Price dated Oct 27, 2026 · tokenized ORCLx	$131	$394.7B	20.5	Unavailable	$67.4BFY ended 2026-05-31 · 10-K	+17.3%FY ended 2026-05-31 vs 2025-05-31 · 10-K	17,087,000,000FY ended 2026-05-31, attributable to the company · 10-K	30.6%FY ended 2026-05-31
Palantir Technologies Inc. PLTR · Price dated Oct 27, 2026 · tokenized PLTRx	$199	$477.5B	169.9	Unavailable	$4.5BFY ended 2025-12-31 · 10-K	+56.2%FY ended 2025-12-31 vs 2024-12-31 · 10-K	1,625,033,000FY ended 2025-12-31, attributable to the company · 10-K	31.6%FY ended 2025-12-31
CrowdStrike Holdings Inc. CRWD · Price dated Oct 27, 2026 · tokenized CRWDx	$268	$274.4B	Not meaningfulLoss, diluted EPS −0.45 to 2026-07-31 · SEC filing	Unavailable	$4.8BFY ended 2026-01-31 · 10-K	+21.7%FY ended 2026-01-31 vs 2025-01-31 · 10-K	−162,502,000FY ended 2026-01-31, attributable to the company · 10-K	−6.1%FY ended 2026-01-31
Shopify Inc. SHOP · Price dated Oct 27, 2026	$166	Unavailable	112.0	Unavailable	$11.6BFY ended 2025-12-31 · 10-K	+30.1%FY ended 2025-12-31 vs 2024-12-31 · 10-K	1,231,000,000FY ended 2025-12-31, attributable to the company · 10-K	12.7%FY ended 2025-12-31

Missing figures stay unavailable. Forward P/E requires a dated source. Annual revenue, revenue growth, net income and margin come from each company's own 10-K, in US dollars, and each row shows that fiscal year. Revenue growth compares the fiscal year with the prior year stated in the same 10-K. Net income is the full year amount attributable to the company, or available to common stockholders where the filing states only that, or consolidated net income. Each row names its basis. Trailing P/E reads "Not meaningful" when the dated trailing diluted EPS is a loss or zero. An operating margin appears only when the filing states both the operating income and the revenue for the same year.

Sources: SEC filings, Gloria daily closes and CoinGecko. Oldest record refresh: Oct 27, 2026, 9:36 PM EDT. Refresh is not a price or filing date. Each row shows its price date and its annual fiscal period. Peers use industry code and company size, or editorial selection. Market cap multiplies that row price by the company share total the latest SEC filing states for every share class together. Trailing P/E divides it by trailing diluted earnings from SEC filings. Rolled earnings per share are approximate because share counts can change between periods. Both appear only when the SEC data carries its date, so they are estimates at one price date, not synchronized filing valuations. Not investment advice.

Lawmakers in Washington say the AI infrastructure boom could pose risks to the broader financial system. They also have no plans to increase federal financial support if those risks turn into real problems.

The size of the bet

The AI infrastructure buildout is projected to require more than $10 trillion in US investment through 2032. That works out to approximately 3.6% of annual US GDP.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren is among the lawmakers raising alarms about these rising capital expenditures. An analysis released on September 24, 2026, tied the risks to the complicated debt structures increasingly used to pay for the buildout.

Those structures include leases, project finance and special-purpose vehicles, or SPVs. An SPV is essentially a separate legal entity created to hold an asset and its debt. That setup can keep the borrowing off the parent company’s own balance sheet.

Oracle, Microsoft, Amazon, Meta and Alphabet are expected to post combined capex of over $800 billion in 2026. That figure exceeds what those companies currently generate in operating cash flow.

Where the debt is hiding

The shift toward off-balance-sheet financing changes the calculus. Leverage is rising, and the risk is moving outward to the banks, private credit funds and real estate vehicles now involved in the financing.

One example shows how this looks in practice. A New Mexico data center associated with Oracle and Blue Owl drew $18 billion in bank loans plus $3 billion in equity.

When debt sits inside SPVs and lease arrangements, it becomes harder for regulators, investors and lenders to see the full exposure in one place.

The revenue gap

The industry needs around $3.7 trillion in annual revenue by 2032 to deliver projected returns. Current combined estimates for OpenAI and Anthropic sit at about $100 billion.

Why Washington is paying attention now

The current cycle adds a wider cast of financiers. Banks, private credit funds and real estate vehicles all have exposure, which raises both the total leverage in the system and the difficulty of tracking it.

With the US midterms approaching, questions about who bears the cost if the AI boom stumbles are likely to become more charged. Policymakers have stated their refusal to provide federal backstops or bailouts.

What this means for investors and lenders

The key things to watch are the disclosures. How much debt sits in SPVs and leases, which lenders hold it, and whether regulators push for more transparency will shape how contained any downturn might be.

Disclosure: This article was edited by Diego Almada Lopez. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.

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