Ares and Gemes: AI debt looks safer than it is (opens the source in a new tab)
- Ares’ Fall 2026 ‘In The Gaps’ says insurers, long the market’s most cautious investors, now hold venture-style risk packaged as investment-grade bonds funding the AI build-out.
- Ares traced 100+ financings back to eight names, from Meta and Oracle to OpenAI and Anthropic, and notes chip resale values are assumed anywhere from 10% to 60%.
- Orlando Gemes’ LinkedIn summary adds early warnings: Meta-linked Beignet bonds hit a record low near 94.4, and Oracle sent a force majeure notice on its Project Jupiter campus.
- 100+
- financings Ares traced
- 8
- names behind them all
- 94.4
- Beignet bond price, record low
Why it matters A bond can pass every rating test and still fail a load nobody tested, and the insurers holding it are the ones backing retirees’ annuities.
Other side Gemes says none of this is a default yet, Oracle calls its notice precautionary and Blue Owl says its commitments are unchanged. Is this a structural flaw, or partly just rates?