The AI race may be decided by financing—not just better chips

In today’s CEO Daily: CEOs should ask who’s on the hook in AI financing deals.

The big leadership story: Anthropic prepares for the 2028 election.

The markets: Mostly up after reports on OpenAI’s revenue shook up the AI trade Plus: All the news and watercooler chat from Fortune Good morning.

Will winning the AI race come down to creating better chips or creating financial ties that make customers harder to lose? This week brought more evidence that the competition in AI extends beyond technology into financing.

Broadcom has reportedly held talks to raise around $30 billion in debt to help OpenAI buy chips they are developing together, following a similar $35 billion Anthropic deal and another $60 billion package in the works for Anthropic and others.

Nvidia recently partnered with six finance firms to mobilize over $500 billion in third-party capital to finance customers’ AI infrastructure; it has direct stakes in AI companies valued at almost $100 billion.

Meanwhile, AMD has offered OpenAI and Meta warrants for up to 320 million shares at a penny each to give those customers a stake in its success.

These playbooks are not new.

Manufacturers like General Motors and General Electric have long helped customers buy their products through financing and investing in infrastructure.

What’s different, perhaps, is the scale and uncertainty around the core product.

As Nvidia, Broadcom, and AMD compete through financing and equity incentives, there’s also the question of competition.

Are customers paying the right price and can they shop around? Before building their businesses around an AI provider, leaders should understand the ecosystem behind it: what capital is firmly committed, who bears the losses, and whether investment or purchasing agreements constrain its choices—and ultimately theirs.

Much of this financing rests on the labs’ revenue growth, which is why the numbers matter.

As OpenAI and Anthropic move toward IPOs, we should get a clearer picture.