BlackRock is seizing an 80% stake in Meta’s $14 billion El Paso data center, merging Wall Street capital and Big Tech infrastructure to control the physical backbone of artificial intelligence while keeping the financial risk off the books.
When the world’s largest asset manager teams up with one of the most powerful censorship platforms to build the computing centers that will run AI, Americans need to ask who actually owns the internet's foundation—and who gets left holding the bag when the debt comes due.
Under the joint venture, funds managed by BlackRock will own 80% of the Texas campus, while Meta retains 20% and stays on as the sole tenant once the servers come online in 2028. Meta contributes the land and partially built assets valued at $2.3 billion and walks away with a $1 billion one-time payment, according to the Los Angeles Times. BlackRock puts up roughly $4.9 billion in cash. The remaining balance—$12.5 billion—is pure debt.
Interesting Engineering framed the venture as a jobs bonanza, quoting BlackRock CEO Larry Fink promising the project will create "thousands of skilled jobs" and Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg claiming the partnership ensures "the benefits of this technology are distributed to everyone." But the working class should read the fine print. The construction peaks at 4,000 jobs, but the finished facility employs just 300 people full-time.
The real story is the financing. TNW reported that the structure is explicitly designed to keep the massive project off Meta’s balance sheet, letting the social media giant book its use of the campus as rent instead of capital spending. This comes as Meta faces pressure to justify its massive $125 billion to $145 billion capital expenditure outlook for the year.
BlackRock, meanwhile, is playing both sides of the deal. TNW noted the firm is "originating the infrastructure and then selling the debt that funds it." And that debt is already showing cracks. The Los Angeles Times reported that BlackRock's $12.5 billion bond sale faced "weaker-than-expected investor demand," forcing yields that looked more like riskier junk bonds than safe investment-grade debt.
The mechanics carry real risk. The debt backing these campuses is long-dated, but the servers inside them depreciate in a handful of years. If the AI boom stalls, the lease runs shorter than the life of the hardware it houses. This isn't BlackRock and Meta's first dance either; TNW reported Meta used the exact same off-balance-sheet arithmetic for its $200 billion Louisiana Hyperion campus, handing 80% to outside investors and leasing it back.
Fink and Zuckerberg are selling this as a partnership for progress, but when Wall Street writes the checks and Big Tech writes the algorithms, Americans are left to wonder who controls the switch—and who pays when the hardware becomes obsolete long before the bonds mature.