The Fermi TensorWave lease is worth about $6.5 billion over 15 years, and as of Friday nobody has publicly agreed to stand behind it. Fermi Inc. (FRMI) and TensorWave TEX1 pushed the closing of their 222-megawatt data center lease from September 30 to October 31, and the amendment says why in plain language. The two companies are still negotiating a guaranty of certain lease obligations with an investment-grade counterparty, and they need the extra month to finish it.
Fermi shares traded around $4.60 on Friday, down roughly 44% year to date and about 20% over the past month, a slide that tracks the market’s growing doubt about whether the financing behind Project Matador comes together on time. A 222-megawatt, 15-year lease is only worth its headline figure if a counterparty with a real balance sheet promises to pay when the tenant cannot, and for now no such name has been attached to the Fermi TensorWave deal.
Fermi has lost about 44% year to date as the market waits for a guarantor to stand behind its $6.5 billion TensorWave lease. Source: TradingView · Chart: FinanceFeedsThe First Amendment to the Fermi TensorWave Lease Moved Closing to October 31
Fermi Campus 1 LLC and TensorWave TEX1, LLC signed a First Amendment to their Data Center Lease and Services Agreement, moving the closing date from September 30 to October 31, 2026, according to the company’s own release. The underlying lease was signed in August 2026, and the amendment states that all other terms remain unchanged and in effect, so this is a scheduling change built around a single unresolved condition rather than a renegotiation of the deal.
Fermi said the parties extended the date to finalize that guaranty and complete the remaining closing conditions, which the release lists as executing work letters and guaranties, finalizing operations schedules and a service-level agreement, obtaining board approvals, and securing project-level financing sufficient to fund construction. The one-month slip adds to a closing already stacked with unmet conditions and hard dates.
Investor Takeaway
Treat the missing investment-grade guarantor as the real story, because without it the $6.5 billion is contingent revenue rather than contracted revenue.
An Investment-Grade Guaranty Is What Turns 222 MW Into a $6.5 Billion Promise
Under a lease guaranty, if TensorWave, the tenant, cannot make its payments over the 15-year term, the guarantor pays instead, which is why that guarantor’s credit quality decides whether the $6.5 billion is a bankable receivable or a contingent hope. An investment-grade counterparty, one rated at least BBB- or Baa3, is what would let Fermi’s lenders and board treat the lease revenue as money the company can borrow against. Without that signature, the number rests on a young tenant’s promise to pay for a decade and a half.
That is why the missing name has become the center of a governance fight. Co-founder and largest shareholder Toby Neugebauer, with related entities holding about 22% of the stock, filed a formal proposal for an independent review of Fermi’s extraordinary transactions, and the filing states that as of the morning of September 10, the company had not confirmed the guaranteed agreement it said would support the lease, nor that the underlying project financing had been secured. Shareholders vote on that proposal at the October 30 annual meeting, the day before the Fermi TensorWave lease is due to close.
$6.5 Billion Across 222 MW and 15 Years Pencils Out to About $1.95 Million per Megawatt-Year
Spread across 222 megawatts and 15 years, the $6.5 billion works out to roughly $433 million a year, or about $1.95 million per megawatt per year, and close to $29 million per megawatt over the full term. Those are landlord-and-power economics, the return on leasing capacity and delivering electricity, and they sit well below the per-megawatt figures a compute operator books for renting out GPUs on top of that power.
The gap between the two layers is visible up the stack. CoreWeave (CRWV) has signed short-dated cloud contracts at about $40 million per megawatt on an annualized basis, against a roughly $10 million fleet-wide rate, because it sells scarce accelerated compute by the month rather than power by the decade. Fermi sits at the base as the power-and-real-estate layer, lower-margin but, in theory, far more durable, provided the tenant above it can pay. That is the weight the guaranty carries, since it converts durable-in-theory revenue into a financing a lender will underwrite for the Fermi TensorWave lease.
Redburn’s $54 Sell on CoreWeave Is the Same Question Priced in Public
The doubt hanging over Fermi’s private financing is the same doubt public investors are now pricing into the largest names in AI infrastructure. On September 21, Rothschild & Co Redburn initiated coverage of CoreWeave with a Sell rating and a $54 target, arguing that credit markets are beginning to price risks equity markets largely ignore, and that hyperscalers carry more leverage than their balance sheets show once off-balance-sheet commitments are counted.
That warning maps onto a lease like Fermi’s. A 15-year obligation guaranteed by an investment-grade third party is exactly the kind of commitment that sits beside a balance sheet rather than on it, and its value depends entirely on the guarantor’s credit. FinanceFeeds’ breakdown of the $54 Sell against CoreWeave’s $97.85 convertible strike shows how far apart the credit and equity reads can sit on one company, and the same tension runs under Fermi. CoreWeave’s stock fell when its debt got more expensive, a reminder that in this buildout the financing terms move the equity as much as demand does.
What Happens on October 31 if the Guaranty Is Not There
Nothing about the lease is final until the guaranty and the other conditions are met, so October 31 is a test rather than a settlement. If the investment-grade guaranty is signed and the remaining conditions are cleared, the lease closes and Fermi can book the $6.5 billion as contracted revenue. If they are not, the parties can extend again, renegotiate, or let the deal lapse, and each outcome lands differently on a stock already down more than 40% this year. FinanceFeeds’ bull and bear case on Fermi frames how wide that range runs.
The nearer flashpoint is October 30. Shareholders vote that day on the Neugebauer group’s call for an independent strategic review, a vote that doubles as a referendum on whether the board has been straight about the guaranty and the financing behind the Fermi TensorWave lease. The guarantor’s name, whenever it appears, is the single fact that would turn a $6.5 billion headline into $6.5 billion of underwritten revenue.
Investor Takeaway
Read the CoreWeave Sell call as the public-market version of the same question, and watch whether credit risk keeps repricing across AI-infrastructure names.