TeraWulf secures Google credit support for $19 billion Anthropic data center leases in Kentucky

What TeraWulf announced

TeraWulf said on 4 November 2026 that it has executed credit support agreements with Google covering the debt it plans to raise for its Justified Data Campus in Hawesville, Kentucky. Google, a subsidiary of Alphabet, will provide contractual credit support for anticipated debt financing tied to about $19 billion of contracted lease commitments from Anthropic. TeraWulf points to Alphabet's senior unsecured debt ratings, AA+ from S&P Global Ratings and Aa2 from Moody's, as the basis that should let it borrow on better terms.

On the same day TeraWulf signed a definitive engineering, procurement and construction agreement with Fluor Enterprises for three data center buildings on the campus. It builds on a limited notice to proceed announced in March 2026 and sets delivery milestones, open-book cost reporting, procurement oversight and performance protections. A guaranteed maximum price is still being set as engineering and procurement progress. Chief executive Paul Prager said Google's credit support "strengthens our ability to secure competitive project financing", while Fluor expands the company's capacity to build at scale.

TeraWulf did not disclose the amount or duration of Google's support, the size of the borrowing or its expected pricing. The announcement covers agreements for future debt; it does not announce that a financing has closed. Coverage by Investing.com and Blockspace confirms the same terms.

The Anthropic leases behind the deal

TeraWulf first announced the Anthropic lease on 6 July 2026. It covers about 401 MW of critical IT load for an initial term of 20 years and is expected to bring in about $19 billion of contracted revenue. The campus sits on the site of the former Century Aluminum smelter in Hawesville, which stopped operating in 2022. Initial capacity is expected in the second half of 2027, with phased delivery running into the second quarter of 2028. A TeraWulf filing gives Anthropic options for two further five-year terms.

At the time, TeraWulf said it expected the lease to be supported by an investment-grade credit, without naming who. Google now fills that role. Blockspace, reading the company's filing, reports that Google can step into Anthropic's rent or pay a declining termination fee if Anthropic defaults, that the backstop starts only when each lease's final data hall is delivered, and that its right to reject a lease in the first years is linked to how much of the power is used by Google TPU pods. TeraWulf's release itself does not describe the chips that will run in the buildings.

What changed and why it matters

Google has used the same structure before with TeraWulf, but for leases to Fluidstack at its Lake Mariner campus in New York and its Abernathy project in Texas. In Kentucky it backs a lease signed by Anthropic, a company in which Google is also an investor and whose models run on Google Cloud TPUs among other chips. For a developer that started as a bitcoin miner, an AA+ rated backstop is what turns a long lease to a fast-growing but loss-making AI company into debt that banks and bond buyers will price close to investment grade.

For Anthropic, the deal is one more piece of a compute build-out that it has described in its amended S-1 filing, alongside cloud contracts with Google and Amazon. It also fits a wider pattern of AI tenants and chip suppliers lending their balance sheets to data center developers, as in the Drax and Brookfield plan and NVIDIA's Vera Rubin capacity with Oracle. The risk sits with the guarantor: if AI demand falls short, the party that signed the backstop is left paying for the building.

What to watch next

More data center deals are in our AI chips and infrastructure coverage. The next step is the debt itself. Earlier reports, including Bloomberg's, said TeraWulf was seeking several billion dollars to build the campus; the actual size, lenders and interest rate will show how much Google's support lowered the cost. Fluor's guaranteed maximum price, the first data hall completions expected from late 2027, and any disclosure of which accelerators Anthropic installs are the other milestones. TeraWulf reports its results quarterly, and its next filing should say more about the terms.

Questions people ask

Is Google paying for the Anthropic data center in Kentucky?

No. Google provides credit support for TeraWulf's planned debt, which means it backs Anthropic's lease obligations to lenders. TeraWulf has not disclosed the amount of that support or the size of the debt.

How big is TeraWulf's Anthropic lease?

About 401 MW of critical IT load for 20 years at the Justified Data Campus in Hawesville, Kentucky, worth about $19 billion in contracted revenue over the initial term.

When will the Hawesville campus be ready?

TeraWulf expects initial capacity in the second half of 2027, with phased delivery through the second quarter of 2028.

Sources

1. TeraWulf Secures Google Credit Backstop for Project Financing in Support of $19 Billion Anthropic Lease; Executes Definitive Fluor EPC Agreement (TeraWulf, 4 Nov 2026)
2. TeraWulf secures Google credit support for $19B project (Investing.com, 4 Nov 2026)
3. Google backstops TeraWulf's $19 billion Anthropic leases in Kentucky (Blockspace, 4 Nov 2026)
4. AI company Anthropic commits to long-term Hawesville campus (Spectrum News 1, 6 Jul 2026)