Core Scientific (CORZ) Shareholders Rejected a $9B Sale. Does the AMD Deal Vindicate Them?

The statement is much important than the archetypal announcement suggested. Core Scientific's net merchandise described 15-year agreements covering astir 530 megawatts crossed 5 sites, with much than $14 cardinal of imaginable basal contracted revenue. Its regulatory filing provided an important distinction: AMD straight leased 377 megawatts, portion an unnamed neocloud leased different 152 megawatts nether agreements that springiness AMD definite instrumentality protections and rights if that lawsuit defaults.

The larger story, however, began 9 months earlier. Core Scientific shareholders rejected an all-stock acquisition by CoreWeave whose announcement-date implied equity worth was astir $9 billion. The fixed speech ratio valued CORZ astatine $20.40 per stock erstwhile the transaction was announced successful July 2025, but the worth shareholders would person received astatine closing was not fixed and moved with CoreWeave's stock price.

In January, Gullane Capital Partners laminitis Trip Miller, who had opposed the sale, predicted that Core Scientific would unafraid caller AI customers. "I expect them to denote deals for AI with 3rd parties different than CoreWeave," helium told Business Insider.

The caller agreements look to present precisely that lawsuit diversification. Taken together, AMD's 377-megawatt nonstop lease and the neocloud's 152-megawatt lease transcend Miller's astir 400-megawatt expectation, though AMD itself did not straight lease the afloat 529 megawatts. The question is whether the agreements beryllium that shareholders were close to sphere Core Scientific's independence, oregon simply springiness the institution a large, capital-intensive accidental whose eventual worth remains uncertain.

BULL CASE

AMD statement validates the cardinal statement shareholders made erstwhile they rejected CoreWeave: Core Scientific's powerfulness portfolio could pull large customers beyond its existing tenant.

Before the caller agreements, CoreWeave remained Core Scientific's lone meaningful high-density colocation customer. Core Scientific had leased astir 590 megawatts to CoreWeave, and a azygous lawsuit generated 77% of the company's first-half revenue.

The caller leases astir treble full leased lawsuit powerfulness capableness to astir 1.1 gigawatts. Core Scientific said that capableness present represents much than $24 cardinal of imaginable contracted revenue, including the existing CoreWeave narration and the caller agreements connected to AMD.