Nvidia's CEO says demand for AI computing is huge, but money is short

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang says demand for "neocloud" companies is "off the charts," but they cannot grow as fast as they want because money is hard to find. He told CNBC on Thursday, at Nvidia's GTC conference in Berlin, that "there's a scarcity of capital."

What neoclouds are

Neoclouds are firms that rent out AI computing power. CoreWeave and Nebius are two examples. Huang said the missing piece is working capital, meaning the cash needed to keep building. "The demand of the capital is much greater than the availability of the capital," he said. "That's going to get solved." He gave no timeline in the reported comments.

Why investors are nervous

Neocloud stocks have been selling off lately. Investors worry about how much is being spent on AI buildouts and that returns will take longer than expected. They also watch how much debt CoreWeave uses to build data centers. In premarket trading Thursday:

• Nebius was down 3.6%.
• CoreWeave was down 4%.
• Iren and Applied Digital each fell nearly 4%.

Power is another limit, especially in Europe, where electricity prices are higher. Huang said getting scarce energy to companies like Nebius and Mistral is crucial for their growth.

Nvidia is putting its own money into the region. It has committed nearly $10 billion to European companies, universities and research groups. Last week in London it announced a stake worth over $1 billion in five U.K. startups. For businesses that rely on AI tools, the open question is whether the money and power arrive fast enough to keep computing supply growing.