Key Takeaways
- Nebius fell 33% from the end of September through Friday’s close as worries about CoreWeave’s debt and rising rates hit AI cloud stocks, and Nebius had no bad news of its own.
- Nebius had far less debt than CoreWeave at midyear, but analysts expect its capex to reach about $29 billion in 2027, and a lower stock price makes that harder to fund.
- A new $3.5 billion loan from Citi buys time, and Bank of America’s $310 target would need Nebius’s forward sales multiple to roughly double, to about 12x.
- At about 6x forward sales, Nebius looks like a buy for investors who can handle the swings, and the November report should show how much of 2027 customers are paying for up front.
Nebius Group (NBIS) has lost 33% since the end of September (through Friday’s close on October 23), and almost none of the bad news was its own.
The scare started at CoreWeave (CRWV). It fell 38% over the same stretch as investors worried about how much it has borrowed to build AI data centers. The Nasdaq 100 fell 5%.
Bank of America is sticking with Nebius anyway. On Thursday, analyst Tal Liani reiterated his Buy rating and $310 target, 95% above Friday’s close. He rates CoreWeave a Buy too, but his note said it will likely need about $20 billion more to fund what it has promised customers.
Nebius Paid for CoreWeave’s Debt
It started on Oct. 14, when a hotter-than-expected inflation report revived talk of another Fed rate hike and the yield on CoreWeave’s 2032 notes neared 15%. Gartner piled on the same day, forecasting that more than 80% of neocloud providers won’t be operating independently by 2030. Two days later, worries about CoreWeave’s roughly $50 billion debt load spread to every AI cloud funded with borrowed money, Nebius included.
But Nebius’s balance sheet looked very different. At June 30, it had about $0.5 billion of borrowings net of cash, not counting leases. CoreWeave had roughly $29.5 billion on the same basis.
That gap won’t last, though. Nebius has added $5.75 billion of convertible notes since then, in August, and analysts expect its net debt to reach about $14 billion by the end of this year and $34 billion by the end of 2027.
Citi’s $3.5 Billion Buys Time
On Thursday morning, Nebius announced a $3.5 billion secured loan from Citi to pay for data centers and GPUs. It costs SOFR plus 2.75%, and that margin can rise to 3.5%. As Chief Operating Officer Ophir Nave put it, “Sequencing our financing is how we optimize our long-term cost of capital.”
The loan is far cheaper than the nearly 15% yield on CoreWeave’s 2032 notes, though the two aren’t like for like (a secured bank loan carries less risk for the lender than unsecured bonds).
Investors still sold. Nebius fell 7% that day, while CoreWeave dropped 10%. It’s a bridge loan, secured by substantially all of the borrowers’ assets and due Oct. 16, 2027, and its margin steps up 0.25 points every 90 days, so Nebius has every reason to replace it early. And 2027 is when the bigger bill lands.
TIKR Tracks 23 Analysts on Nebius. How Many Say “Buy”?
See the full breakdown of Buy, Hold, and Sell ratings on Nebius, along with Wall Street’s revenue and earnings estimates, all in one place. More than 500,000 investors use TIKR to research stocks like this one. See Nebius’s Analyst Ratings
Who Pays for 2027?
Nebius’s capex jumped from $808 million in 2024 to $4.07 billion in 2025.
Analysts expect it to reach $23.2 billion this year and $29.1 billion in 2027, more than seven times last year’s spending.
Customers pay for part of it. Nebius expects more than $9 billion of prepayments this year, about 39% of this year’s expected capex. In the second quarter, about 70% of its deals came with prepayments covering 50% to 60% of the capex tied to them.
The rest comes from cash on hand, operating cash flow, debt or new shares, and that last option now costs more. A share sold at Friday’s close raises 29% less than the $223.60 average Nebius got through June, so each sale gives new buyers more of the company.
Does $310 Add Up?
Piper Sandler cut its target 22% to $185 on Oct. 21. Most of Wall Street hasn’t followed: the consensus target went from $284 at the end of September to $281 on Oct. 21, which is 77% above Friday’s close.
Liani expects third-quarter revenue of $906 million, about 520% more than a year earlier and in line with consensus.
At Friday’s close, Nebius traded at 6.1x forward sales (its five-year history includes the former Yandex business and the trading suspension which limits comparability with today’s AI cloud company).
Bank of America’s $310 target would put it near 12x forward sales if sales estimates and share count hold—roughly double Friday’s multiple.
What Nebius’s November Report Has to Show
At 6.1x forward sales, Nebius looks like a buy for investors who can stomach the swings. The business brought in $582 million of second-quarter revenue at a 41% adjusted EBITDA margin, and even after Piper’s cut, Wall Street’s mean target sits 77% above the price. Dilution is the price of admission.
Nebius reports third-quarter results in November, against 2026 revenue guidance of $3 billion to $3.4 billion. The number to watch is how much of 2027 customers are paying for up front. If they keep prepaying, Nebius needs fewer new shares. If they don’t, it will need more outside money in the same year the Citi loan comes due and about $29 billion of capex is planned.
So what is Nebius stock actually worth?
TIKR lets you forecast the future price of any stock in less than a minute. Just enter a few assumptions into TIKR’s valuation model and see what Nebius could be worth. Start from Wall Street consensus estimates, or adjust the inputs to reflect your own view of the business. It’s free to use.
Disclaimer:
Please note that the articles on TIKR are not intended to serve as investment or financial advice from TIKR or our content team, nor are they recommendations to buy or sell any stocks. We create our content based on TIKR Terminal’s investment data and analysts’ estimates. Our analysis might not include recent company news or important updates. TIKR has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. Thank you for reading, and happy investing!
