Record October put volume prices CoreWeave at $35 in 2028, a third below the stock
Record October volume in CoreWeave puts struck at $35 for 2028, hyperscaler credit-default swaps at their highest since 2021, and new desks selling protection against falling chip rents: the AI buildout finally has a price on the downside, and two smaller names report within days.
Vincent Jiang · 3 min read
Trading in put options tied to CoreWeave−9.27% — CoreWeave, down 9.27 percent today hit record levels in October, according to Cboe Global Markets+6.76% — Cboe Global Markets, up 6.76 percent today data. CoreWeave is the largest of the neocloud data-center firms, the companies leasing warehouses of Nvidia−3.89% — Nvidia, down 3.89 percent today chips to OpenAI$500B — OpenAI, private, latest valuation $500B, Anthropic$350B — Anthropic, private, latest valuation $350B and Meta−1.65% — Meta, down 1.65 percent today, and investors are paying for the right to sell its shares long before trouble arrives 1.
The contract of choice says plenty: options expiring in 2028, struck at $35, against a share price near $55 1. That is the options market pricing a third off a company at the center of the AI buildout.
The number being hedged is still going up
Here is the complication. The rental price of an Nvidia B300 chip, the commodity underneath all of this, has risen about 56% this year to $7.56 an hour, per Silicon Data 1. The hedging is not a verdict on today's rents. It is a verdict on what happens when every data center now being built comes online at once.
CoreWeave's capex has outrun its revenue in every quarter it has reported
- Revenue
- Capex
Data
| Revenue | Capex | |
|---|---|---|
| Q1 '24 | $0.19B | $1.74B |
| Q2 '24 | $0.4B | $2.25B |
| Q3 '24 | $0.58B | $1.22B |
| Q4 '24 | $0.75B | $3.5B |
| Q1 '25 | $0.98B | $1.41B |
| Q2 '25 | $1.21B | $2.45B |
| Q3 '25 | $1.37B | $2.39B |
| Q4 '25 | $1.57B | $4.06B |
| Q1 '26 | $2.08B | $7.7B |
| Q2 '26 | $2.58B | $6.42B |
Jump Trading has launched a desk selling derivatives that protect data-center operators against falling chip rental prices, and Susquehanna is fielding interest in contracts tracking computing-power indexes 1. Until now there was no instrument to short the price of compute. There is one.
The credit market joined in October
Credit-default swaps on Amazon−1.20% — Amazon, down 1.20 percent today, Alphabet−0.82% — Alphabet, down 0.82 percent today, Microsoft−1.38% — Microsoft, down 1.38 percent today, Meta and Oracle−6.21% — Oracle, down 6.21 percent today, the cost of insuring their debt against default, recently climbed to their highest level since 2021, with Oracle's spreads widening by more than a percentage point 1. The Nasdaq Composite fell 2.9% on Friday, its worst month since March 2025 1. CoreWeave has lost a quarter of its value in a month, and Nebius−9.45% — Nebius, down 9.45 percent today, IREN−7.96% — IREN, down 7.96 percent today and Applied Digital−7.52% — Applied Digital, down 7.52 percent today have shed as much or more 2.
The bulls call the selling irrational
CoreWeave's chief executive Mike Intrator calls the market's reaction "irrational" and points to a customer queue of the world's most consequential companies 2. Analysts at Yorkville Ives say demand for computing power still exceeds supply, and that neoclouds fill a gap the hyperscalers cannot 2. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent downplayed the sector as "a small component of the overall ecosystem" 2.
Against them: Gartner+1.66% — Gartner, up 1.66 percent today expects 80% of neocloud firms to cease independent operations by 2030, and Elon Musk has predicted "guppy-level death and consolidation" among more than 200 of them 2.
Two earnings calls this week settle it
Two smaller names on this beat report within days. DigitalOcean−9.08% — DigitalOcean, down 9.08 percent today prints third-quarter results on November 3 3; Core Scientific−8.50% — Core Scientific, down 8.50 percent today, a high-density colocation operator that repurposed bitcoin mining sites for AI workloads, reports on November 5 4.
Neoclouds borrow against their contracts and their chips, so if rents fall the collateral behind those loans would fall with them, and the B300 hourly rate is the number to watch when both companies report 12. If that rate holds near $7.56, the hedgers are early 12. If it rolls over, they were the only ones reading the tape.
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