{"id":1313,"date":"2026-07-22T18:22:47","date_gmt":"2026-07-22T18:22:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/valutednews.com\/?p=1313"},"modified":"2026-07-22T18:22:47","modified_gmt":"2026-07-22T18:22:47","slug":"oracles-exploding-debt-and-diving-stock-threaten-paramount-empire","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/valutednews.com\/?p=1313","title":{"rendered":"Oracle’s Exploding Debt and Diving Stock Threaten Paramount Empire"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Oracle’s<\/div>

<\/p>\n

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The foundations of the hastily assembled Ellison family hasbara media empire \u2014 Paramount, WBD, American TikTok \u2014 are cracking as Oracle stock has lost $600 billion in market cap since its September 2025 peak and its nearly $200 billion in corporate debt is close to junk bond status.<\/p>\n

Oracle Stock Ain\u2019t What It Used to Be<\/strong><\/p>\n

And neither is the Ellison family fortune that\u2019s built on it.<\/p>\n

\n

pic.twitter.com\/2IFQEKNG6p<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Nat Wilson Turner (@natwilsonturner) July 22, 2026<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Never fear, the consensus wisdom \u201con the Street\u201d is that Oracle is a great buy opportunity<\/a>! Buy the dip, follow it all the way down.<\/p>\n

Yahoo! Finance<\/a> calls the stock plunge \u201cembarrassing\u201d for Larry Ellison (he may be only the world\u2019s 8th richest human, but he\u2019s just a temporarily embarrassed #2 as Steinbeck would say):<\/p>\n

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Oracle (ORCL) billionaire and well-known yachting expert Larry Ellison might spend his summer aboard his 160-foot superyacht dubbed the Musashi.<\/p>\n

But, for lack of better terms, his stock has sunk to the ocean floor, and it\u2019s unclear what will bring it back afloat.<\/p>\n

\u2026<\/p>\n

The crash has vaporized a good deal of Ellison\u2019s net worth while he\u2019s backstopping his son David Ellison\u2019s big bid for Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) from Paramount (PSKY).<\/p>\n

Ellison\u2019s net worth peaked near $388 billion in September 2025, making him the second-richest person behind his friend and Tesla (TSLA) and SpaceX (SPCX) CEO Elon Musk. By July 13, Ellison\u2019s net worth had fallen to roughly $175 billion, a decline of approximately $213 billion in under 10 months, dropping him to No. 8 on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.
\u2026
The crash has vaporized a good deal of Ellison\u2019s net worth while he\u2019s backstopping his son David Ellison\u2019s big bid for Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) from Paramount (PSKY).<\/p>\n

Ellison\u2019s net worth peaked near $388 billion in September 2025, making him the second-richest person behind his friend and Tesla (TSLA) and SpaceX (SPCX) CEO Elon Musk. By July 13, Ellison\u2019s net worth had fallen to roughly $175 billion, a decline of approximately $213 billion in under 10 months, dropping him to No. 8 on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Poor guy.<\/p>\n

And the source of the trouble? Oracle\u2019s enormous bets on OpenAI.<\/p>\n

Why Oracle\u2019s Debt Got Downgraded<\/strong><\/p>\n

When SP Global downgraded Oracle\u2019s debt<\/a> to \u2018BBB-\/A-2\u2019 (one step above junk or BB+) from \u2018BBB\/A-2\u2019 they commented:<\/p>\n

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Oracle Corp.\u2019s rapidly expanding AI infrastructure business is increasing its overall credit risk, reflecting our more cautious view of the AI infrastructure industry, including rising capital expenditure (capex) requirements, an uncertain path to profitability, rapidly evolving industry and competitive landscape, and high customer concentration.
\u2026
Oracle\u2019s growing AI infrastructure business is diluting its strong business risk profile. We assigned Oracle a negative outlook in July 2025 due to the pace of its AI infrastructure buildout and the potential financial impact. We now recognize that that we underestimated the scale of the investments required to expand the AI business and its impact on our overall view of Oracle\u2019s creditworthiness.<\/p>\n

Despite recent contract terms requiring customer prepayments, Oracle\u2019s strong remaining performance obligation (RPO) growth speaks to the current robust AI compute demand environment. We project Oracle\u2019s cloud infrastructure business, which accounted for 27% of revenues in fiscal 2026, will make up almost 60% of revenues by fiscal 2028. We view this to be much riskier than its legacy enterprise software and database businesses, which have long-established track records of strong recurring revenues and sticky enterprise customer bases. This is because of the need for substantial upfront investment while returns are realized over the duration of multi-year contracts.<\/p>\n

We\u2019re closely watching the pace of AI industry buildout. Oracle\u2019s AI business requires significant upfront capital investments and long-term data center leases, both of which we have continually underestimated. Rising component costs could also pressure the economics of the AI business model.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

And S&P narrows down a key culprit in Oracle\u2019s woes:<\/p>\n

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OpenAI remains a key credit risk.<\/strong> We estimate that OpenAI makes up roughly half of the $638 billion in RPO. OpenAI\u2019s ability to meet its contractual obligations and raise external financing will be contingent upon AI tailwinds continuing and its models being market leaders. If OpenAI were unable to pay Oracle, we believe Oracle could be left with massive data center leases that it might be unable to exit or have to re-lease to new tenants under less-favorable terms. As a proxy for OpenAI\u2019s future prospects, we\u2019re tracking OpenAI\u2019s financial commitments to data center operators and chip makers to gauge its overall financial exposure and its market share among enterprise and consumers.<\/p>\n

Near-term cash flow will be worse than previously forecasted. Oracle guided its capex to reach $90 billion-$95 billion for fiscal 2027 (ending in May), much higher than our previous forecast of $60 billion. We attribute this mostly to rising component costs and new contract wins. We now forecast Oracle\u2019s fiscal 2027 FOCF deficit to widen to nearly $42 billion (inclusive of working-capital benefits from customer prepayments and other timing impacts, similar to Oracle\u2019s guidance regarding net cash outlay for capex of around $70 billion), weaker than our prior forecast of negative $24 billion.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Elon Musk could have warned Oracle CEO Larry Ellison not to trust OpenAI\u2019s CEO, the man he calls \u201cScam\u201d Altman<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In fairness, S&P believes \u201cOracle is firmly committed to keeping an investment-grade rating. Oracle\u2019s focus on better aligning cash outlays with customer prepayments when pursuing new deals\u2013 as well as its $5 billion mandatory convertible preferred stock issuance in February 2026 and the planned $20 billion equity issuance in calendar-year 2026\u2013lend credibility to its stated financial policy, which we view to be more conservative than a year ago.\u201d<\/p>\n

But Oracle itself is warning investors that its data center bets may not pay off.<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t Say Larry Didn\u2019t Warn Us<\/strong><\/p>\n

Per Bloomberg<\/a>:<\/p>\n

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Oracle has a new warning for investors: All of the spending on data centers might not pay off.<\/p>\n

The disclosures were part of the company\u2019s annual financial report<\/a>, where Oracle detailed plans to spend big on AI infrastructure for customers like OpenAI. And it noted all of the ways that expensive bet could blow up.<\/p>\n

Construction of data centers may end up costing more or taking longer than expected, Oracle warned. This could happen due to supply chain hiccups, government restrictions on data center development, or the failure of third parties to complete projects on schedule.<\/p>\n

And once the sites are done, major customers might not pay their bills, or opt not to renew their contracts, Oracle said. In this case, the company could be stuck with some very expensive assets, which it \u201cmay be unable to re-lease, repurpose or assign such capacity on acceptable terms, if at all.\u201d<\/p>\n

Most large tech companies list data center-related risks in their financial filings. But few are as verbose as Oracle when it comes to exactly how things could go wrong.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

And Oracle\u2019s debt picture might be even worse than they\u2019ve been reporting according to a blockbuster report from Nikkei<\/a> (archived<\/a>):<\/p>\n

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Hidden debt at U.S. tech giants swelled eightfold in roughly four years to an estimated $1.65 trillion as artificial intelligence investments ballooned, a Nikkei study shows, exceeding actual debt and making it tougher for investors to assess risk.<\/p>\n

Nikkei examined recent financial statements and other materials from Google owner Alphabet, Microsoft, Amazon, Meta and Oracle.
\u2026
The five companies\u2019 hidden debt, which does not appear on balance sheets, totaled $1.65 trillion in the most recent quarter, exceeding the roughly $1.35 trillion in debt reflected on their balance sheets. The data includes some estimates.
\u2026
Oracle is advancing a large-scale data center project called Stargate with OpenAI, using lease agreements with external operators. Its hidden debt reached $273.3 billion as of the end of May, a more-than 30-fold increase in four years.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Holy family blogging, scam man! A hundred billion here and a hundred billion there and pretty soon we\u2019re talking real money.<\/p>\n

And I\u2019ve got to emphasize again that Oracle\u2019s plan to pay all this debt back rides almost entirely on OpenAI.<\/p>\n

A Debt Built on Sand?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Not to get all Matthew 7:26-27<\/a> on y\u2019all but Larry Ellison betting his empire on OpenAI might be \u201clike a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash.\u201d<\/p>\n

And as Ed Zitron points out<\/a>:<\/p>\n

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As a reminder, the only way that OpenAI will be able to afford to pay its $300 billion cloud compute contract with Oracle will be if it continues to hit revenue projections (per The Information) that have it making $113 billion in 2028, $184 billion in 2029, and $284 billion in 2030, a year when it will magically become profitable, and no, I don\u2019t know how that happens:<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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pic.twitter.com\/IwDIgBVtUK<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Nat Wilson Turner (@natwilsonturner) July 22, 2026<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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Based on my own analysis<\/a>, assuming that Oracle can successfully build capacity for OpenAI to pay for (a load-bearing assumption), it would have to pay around $75 billion to rent that 7.1GW of capacity. Stargate Abilene,\u00a0an 8-building, 1.2GW project that broke ground in July 2024<\/a>, has (per sources familiar with the matter) only built and operationalized three buildings, despite the project having meant to be fully operational by the end of 2025 (per landowner Lancium<\/a>), or\u00a0energized by the middle of 2026<\/a>, it isn\u2019t really clear, and I can\u2019t get a straight answer from anyone about whether the\u00a0power\u00a0<\/em>even exists on site to turn any of it on.<\/p>\n

Anyway, for Oracle to make all the rest of that money, it will have to build\u00a0five more Stargate Abilenes.\u00a0<\/em>If you\u2019re wondering how that\u2019s going,\u00a0Stargate Shackelford only broke ground in December 2025<\/a>,\u00a0Stargate Wisconsin appeared to have a single steam beam in March<\/a>,\u00a0, and\u00a0<\/a>Stargate New Mexico is still waiting for permitting to begin construction<\/a>.<\/a><\/p>\n

Based on Lancium\u2019s presentation<\/a>\u00a0and discussions with sources familiar, Oracle will pull in somewhere in the region of $10 billion in annual revenue from the (assuming it\u2019s ever done),\u00a0completely-finished<\/em>\u00a0824MW of critical IT infrastructure at Stargate Abilene. It is unclear how Oracle hopes to be paid even a fraction of its $300 billion compute deal, because in its current state, its annual revenue from Stargate projects currently sits in the region of a maximum $5 billion a year, or less than a tenth of its FY2026 capex.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

And as the NYT\u2019s Jeff Sommer reminds us<\/a>, the Ellison hasbara media empire<\/a> may nominally be managed by nepobaby failson David Ellison but it rests on a foundation of Daddy Larry\u2019s Oracle money:<\/p>\n

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Wealth from\u00a0Oracle<\/a>, the giant tech company founded by Larry Ellison, is enabling Larry and his son, David, to become media moguls. Thanks to\u00a0backing<\/a>\u00a0from Larry\u2019s Oracle billions, David has\u00a0taken control<\/a>\u00a0of Paramount and is now engaged in a\u00a0hotly contested<\/a>\u00a0$111 billion bid to take over Warner Bros. Discovery, too. They are trying to build a media behemoth containing two big movie studios, multiple streaming services and the news networks CNN and CBS News, all under one enormous corporate roof.
\u2026
Few people outside the markets have paid attention to what goes on behind the financial curtain for artificial intelligence. These big companies are able to categorize the money as an investment \u2014 a capital expenditure \u2014 and not as an expense. So under current accounting rules, the bulk of the spending has not yet counted against their gaudy earnings. That is helping to propel the stock market to new heights under rosy assumptions that A.I. will transform the world, and that the companies behind it will be making money.<\/p>\n

With the notable exception of Oracle, which has borrowed aggressively for the last couple of years, most of these companies generated so much cash from their main businesses that, until recently, their spending on A.I. data centers barely weighed on the performance of their stock or on the solidity of their underlying finances.<\/p>\n

But this year is turning out to be different.
\u2026
Four of the five big, long-established data-center companies have underperformed the S&P 500 this year. Oracle has been leading the pack downward, with a fall of more than 35 percent through Friday.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

And there\u2019s a reason Oracle is at the back of the AI pack, via the Seattle Times<\/a>:<\/p>\n

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The risk for Oracle is falling behind in a race it set out to conquer. Other AI hyperscalers, like Alphabet and Meta Platforms, are on an opposite course, generating more than enough cash to fund investment. That gives them \u201cgreater financial flexibility to outspend Oracle and weather industry downturns,\u201d according to S&P.<\/p>\n

The ratings agency said it has continually underestimated how much Oracle would need to spend upfront for AI investments. That investment has led the company to burn through more than $20 billion over the last four quarters, after capital expenditure.<\/p>\n

\u201cOracle wants to hang on to that investment-grade rating, and to do that, they\u2019re going to have to show that they are not flooding the market with more supply,\u201d said Andrew Wells, chief investment officer at SanJac Alpha. \u201cThey\u2019re kind of on the ropes and they have to decide: Do they disappoint the bond investors or the equity investors?\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

But let\u2019s get back to the Ellison family\u2019s media empire and how it gets that way<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Those no-fun types at the National Legal and Policy Center tried to pour cold water<\/a> on the Ellison\u2019s Paramount + WBD party:<\/p>\n

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From where we sit, the founder\u2019s Hollywood<\/a> adventure looks less like devotion and more like a transfer of risk onto Oracle\u2019s other owners.<\/p>\n

Start with how the guarantee gets funded. Forbes crunched the numbers in February<\/a>: Ellison holds under $10 billion in cash, about $15 billion in Tesla<\/a> stock, and has sold a mere $4.7 billion of Oracle shares since the turn of the century.<\/p>\n

His trust\u2019s equity commitment to the Warner takeover reached $45.7 billion. The one asset large enough to bridge that gap appears to be his 1.16 billion Oracle shares, worth about $164 billion when Forbes ran its analysis.<\/p>\n

He has form here. A September 2025 disclosure revealed 346 million Oracle shares pledged as collateral for personal business ventures outside the company \u2014 a block worth north of $100 billion at the time.<\/p>\n

Then Oracle\u2019s stock declined by more than half. The pledged shares lost half their value by late February, and the price has now fallen more than 50 percent from last year\u2019s peak<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Falling collateral can trigger margin spirals. Lenders demand more stock or force sales; sales depress the price; the cycle feeds itself \u2014 with outside shareholders along for the ride.<\/p>\n

The timing could not be worse for Oracle. The company ended May with about $130 billion in debt<\/a>, negative free cash flow of $23.7 billion, and capital spending up 162 percent as it races to build data centers for OpenAI and other artificial intelligence customers.<\/p>\n

\u2026<\/p>\n

June brought Oracle\u2019s worst week on Wall Street since 2001<\/a> \u2014 a 19 percent plunge \u2014 along with word that headcount shrank 13 percent over the fiscal year. Ellison, the chief technology officer and owner of more than 40 percent of its shares, skipped the earnings call.<\/p>\n

Two co-chief executives new to their roles and a finance chief hired weeks earlier fielded analysts\u2019 questions instead. The man whose name is synonymous with Oracle was busy buying Warner Bros.<\/p>\n

And what a purchase it is. The Wall Street Journal<\/i> reports<\/a> the combined company will stagger out of the gate under almost $80 billion in debt, about 6.5 times annual earnings \u2014 leverage that MoffettNathanson analysts labeled \u201cstaggering.\u201d<\/p>\n

The merged giant must service that burden from declining television networks while promising no asset sales and no cuts to content spending. If those promises break, or if streaming synergies fall short, the guarantee behind the deal traces straight back to a mountain of Oracle stock.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

And about that WBD acquisition.<\/p>\n

Legal Challenges From All Sides Slowing WBD Buy<\/strong><\/p>\n

For some reason I can\u2019t imagine, there\u2019s a lot of resistance to this oligarchic family<\/a> of ultra-zionists<\/a> buying up so much of American media.<\/p>\n

Comics Beat sums the Ellison empire\u2019s precarity well<\/a>:<\/p>\n

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The Warner Bros. deal, though, is a risky endeavor; neither Paramount nor Warner Bros. have been hugely profitable companies in the recent past, and both are weighed down by a ton of existing debt. The prospect of making enough money to pay back the existing Paramount debt while taking on an additional $100 billion for Warner Bros. is daunting.
\u2026
Meanwhile, there\u2019s a \u201cticking clock\u201d fee on the deal. As long as the deal remains incomplete, Warner Bros. shareholders are exposed to market volatility, so if the deal isn\u2019t done by September, Paramount is on the hook for penalties of around $650 million per quarter, due to existing Warner Bros. shareholders.<\/p>\n

That might be a difficult promise to deliver on when the massive, multinational companies are facing a number of lawsuits seeking to delay or halt the merger \u2014 including one led by the state of California and co-signed by the attorneys general of 11 other U.S. states. The U.K. government has also stepped in to block the merger, and Parliament is currently on summer break, meaning it will be a while before the issue is even fully taken up.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

And about those lawsuits.<\/p>\n

Four Major Lawsuits Delaying the WBD Buy<\/strong><\/p>\n

First up, a coalition of 12 Democratic state attorneys general, led by California AG Rob Bonta, is hitting the court house<\/a> claiming that the deal violates the Clayton Act by creating a media monopoly. The states argue it would heavily reduce competition in theatrical film distribution (specifically anticipated blockbusters) and basic cable licensing.<\/p>\n

This seems the most serious and on Monday a judge issued a temporary restraining order against the merger<\/a> in response to the suit.<\/p>\n

Then there\u2019s a suit filed by three current Paramount+ subscribers and two prospective subscribers<\/a> claiming they face increased prices and reduced viewing options as a result of the transaction.<\/p>\n

This one seems to be weak sauce and has already been denied a preliminary injunction by a judge<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Writers Guild of America (note: I\u2019m a former member but got booted when I got laid off by Vox Media, screw them and screw Vox, he he) has filed an anti-trust suit against the Paramount-WBD merger<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Hollywood Reporter described the fourth suit facing the Ellisons in its headline \u201cDavid and Larry Ellison Sued by Paramount Investor Over Alleged Trump Side Deal<\/a>:<\/p>\n

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A fourth lawsuit has been filed looking to block Paramount\u2018s bid to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery, this time by shareholders who accuse David Ellison and his father, Oracle scion Larry Ellison, of striking an illegal deal with President Trump for approval of the merger.<\/p>\n

In a lawsuit filed on Tuesday in Delaware Chancery Court, the investors claim that the Ellisons promised to make sweeping changes at CNN to greenlight the acquisition. They also point to an alleged promise for up to $20 million in free advertising and a $16 million payment to Trump through a prior settlement by the studio\u2019s previous ownership to resolve an allegedly frivolous lawsuit he had filed against CBS.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

That last one is the most amusing if nothing else and reveals some of the political machinations behind the merger<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Ellisons\u2019 media ambitions have often been portrayed as an effort to support Trump, but despite Trump\u2019s occasional support for their gambit, their real political play is supporting Israel, as illustrated by their promotion of no-talent zionist mouthpiece Bari Weiss to the head of CBS News.<\/a><\/p>\n

The suit falls into the trap of missing the zionist hasbara forest for the Trump tree. A tell is it doesn\u2019t specifically name Hollywood super-agent, UFC owner and Democratic power-player Ari Emanuel<\/a> as a co-defendant despite his role as the Ellisons\u2019 personal Trump whisperer<\/a>.<\/p>\n

I have to quote from the NY Times\u2019 recent profile on Emanuel<\/a> \u2014 which mostly focused on his likely role in his brother Rahm\u2019s 2028 presidential race<\/a> \u2014 since it confirms much of what I\u2019ve been writing about here and at The MMA Draw (with Zach Arnold) about Ari Emanuel playing both sides of the street politically:<\/p>\n

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In June, Trump hosted the U.F.C., which is also owned by TKO Group, on the White House lawn as fighters bloodied each other\u2019s faces in the octagon. Trump and Ari Emanuel exchanged a handshake before the fights commenced.<\/p>\n

Whatever Ari Emanuel decides to do in 2028 will have to be balanced with his relationship with Trump. He represented the president during part of his run on \u201cThe Apprentice,\u201d and TKO Group has lobbied politicians in Washington to back a measure which would allow the company to run its own U.F.C.-like boxing circuit.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

And then there\u2019s the whole role of Gulf State Sovereign wealth funds in backing Paramount\u2019s acquisition of WBD<\/a>, but let\u2019s close with the stress the workers at WBD are feeling as they don\u2019t know who to suck up to in all the confusion.<\/p>\n

Via Business Insider<\/a>:<\/p>\n

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Employees at Paramount Skydance are wrestling with whether the planned mega-merger with Warner Bros. Discovery would put them on the chopping block or help save their jobs.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m definitely worried about impending layoffs post-merger,\u201d a Paramount research staffer said. \u201cBut I\u2019m worried about the company as a whole if it doesn\u2019t go through.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2026<\/p>\n

Twelve Paramount employees Business Insider spoke with after the WBD deal got delayed were split about how the transaction would impact their jobs and the industry.<\/p>\n

Some Paramount staffers fear their positions could be expendable if their teams merge with comparable groups at WBD, while others are concerned about the company\u2019s financial health if its deal is delayed or blocked.
\u2026
\u201cI see Paramount in the same light as Spirit Airlines,\u201d one streaming staffer said. \u201cRegulators didn\u2019t let JetBlue and Spirit Airlines merge. Now Spirit is bankrupt, and JetBlue is struggling.\u201d<\/p>\n

Two WBD employees told Business Insider that they\u2019re uneasy about what the deal may mean for the media industry, but that the acquisition would benefit them financially.<\/p>\n

They both said they stood to considerably benefit from stock grants.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

That\u2019s our fearless independent do-right and damn-the-consequences corporate media at work alright.<\/p>\n

I should also recommend John Campea\u2019s YouTube coverage of the Paramount-WBD merger for those with the time and inclination for video news:<\/p>\n