Chorus Weekly, 8 November 2026
The midterms turned into a vote on data centers, and AI's builders felt it
Texas and Georgia flipped, CoreWeave's 15% debt became the number to watch, and Apple's light AI spending turned into its selling point.
Chorus tracks 59 investor and market shows, and this week 346 people on them shared a view. The election was the week's event, but for investors it quickly became a question about data centers: where they get built, and who pays for them.
The midterms became a vote on data centers
Democrats won control of Congress on Tuesday. The result that moved investors was further down the ballot. On election night, Bloomberg's Kailey Leinz pointed out that the Democratic candidates for governor in Texas and Georgia, two centers of the data center build-out, had campaigned on slowing it down until clearer rules were in place. By the end of the week, 160 people had talked about AI infrastructure, more than any other subject.
CNBC's Pippa Stevens and Daniel Clifton of Baird Strategas both pointed to the same date: December 10, when a report on data center power demand in Texas is due.
Dan Niles: an election can't be reversed
Dan Niles counted Texas, Georgia, Ohio and Pennsylvania among the states that flipped, and said they account for about half of the new US data center capacity coming online. Tariffs or a war can be undone by one decision, he said. A vote can't, so this will take time to sort out.
“when you have senators coming out right after the midterms and saying, we need to stop all new data center construction, this is what you're gonna get.”
Dan Niles, CNBC Closing Bell
Jay Woods: a speed bump, not the end of the road
Jay Woods of Freedom Capital Markets argued that if Texas says no, other states will compete for the business. On the same show, Morgan Stanley's Stephen Byrd made a narrower case. Texas has far more proposed projects than power for them, more than 400 gigawatts against about 90 of peak demand, so most were never going to be built. He's confident a small set that avoids water stress and higher bills will still go ahead.
“This is a speed bump. It is not the end of the road. Far from it. If Texas is foolish enough to say not in our state, there are 49 other states that should be lining up to take that business away.”
Jay Woods, CNBC Power Lunch
The money for the build-out got more expensive
The other half of the worry was financing. CoreWeave, which rents out AI computing power, came up with 16 people, and 13 of them made a bearish call. The number they kept repeating was 15%, about what its bonds now yield.
Barry Sternlicht: nobody builds at 15%
Sternlicht's point was arithmetic. A data center has to earn more than the money that pays for it costs, and at 15% almost none do. He expects the AI cycle to slow as the smaller cloud providers lose access to capital.
“The AI cycle is gonna slow because the [neoclouds] can't get access to capital. If CoreWeave's bonds are 15%, how on earth are they gonna build a data center? Nobody is building a data center to a 15% yield on cost.”
Barry Sternlicht, CNBC Power Lunch
Martin Casado: lenders are picking the biggest names
Martin Casado of a16z said he isn't a debt investor, but sees lenders favoring investment-grade borrowers. He expects scale to win again, and smaller players who depend on borrowing to need their customers to pay up front.
“I'm not a debt guy, but here's what I'm seeing on the ground. We're running out of available debt. And if you're the Norway pension fund, are you gonna give debt to Random Neo Cloud or buy T bills?”
Martin Casado, Invest Like The Best
The other side: Paul Meeks thinks the selloff went too far
Meeks agreed the credit risk has got worse. But he still likes the business, if it gets funded: he has CoreWeave growing from $5 billion of sales last year to $42 billion in three years.
“here's a company that last year did 5,000,000,000 in sales. In three years, they'll do $42,000,000,000 in sales. And I have them in that, 2028 period doing an EBITDA margin of close to 70%, which is a good business.”
Paul Meeks, CNBC Power Lunch
Apple: the company that didn't build data centers
Apple was the most discussed company of the week. 34 people weighed in after its results: 20 made a bullish call and 12 a bearish one. In a week when AI spending was the worry, how little Apple spends on it became the case for owning it.
Steve Eisman: let the AI companies pay rent
Steve Eisman argued that because Apple isn't building its own large AI models, it keeps its free cash flow, and can charge the companies that do for a place on the iPhone.
“It is not building its own LLM models and that is why it still has very very strong free cash flow. It looks like Apple is going to use its iPhone position, its insurmountable iPhone position to make other LLM entities rent space on its platform. It's a potentially low risk, high reward strategy.”
Steve Eisman, The Real Eisman Playbook
Michael Batnick: memory costs are winning
Michael Batnick pointed to the other side of the AI boom. The data center build-out has pushed up the price of memory chips, Apple's price increases haven't covered it, and services growth is slowing too.
“But interestingly, [Apple's] price hikes are not enough to offset margin compression. They're feeling it.”
Michael Batnick, Animal Spirits
Jim Cramer: a slower build-out could help Apple
Jim Cramer tied the two stories together. If the data center build-out slows, memory could get cheaper, and Apple would be one of the first to feel the relief.
“DRAM prices are the single biggest cause of Apple's price increases... Anything that slows down the data center build out means potentially lower DRAM prices”
Jim Cramer, Mad Money with Jim Cramer
Who changed their mind
Jim Cramer on SpaceX: a strong quarter, a new worry
Earlier in the month, Cramer's three views on SpaceX were all bullish. This week he called its quarter very strong, with revenue up 161%, but four of his seven views leaned bearish, on what the election means for the company in Washington and in Texas. Most of the 18 people who talked about SpaceX this week didn't share the worry: 16 of them made a bullish call.
“Now we have to worry about what the blue wave in Congress and Texas means for SpaceX.”
Jim Cramer, Mad Money with Jim Cramer
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