Jon Gray, president and chief operating officer of Blackstone Inc., during the Global Financial Leaders’ Investment Summit in Hong Kong, China, Tuesday, November 3, 2026. This year’s event gathered around 280 global financial leaders, including approximately 120 group chairs and CEOs, with market prospects, the global economy and technological progress among the big themes. Photographer: Anthony Kwan/Bloomberg via Getty Images
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The development of artificial intelligence infrastructure will require more equity financing as lenders increasingly favor the companies driving the development, Blackstone President Jon Gray said Tuesday.
Speaking at the Hong Kong Monetary Authority’s Global Financial Leaders Investment Summit, Gray said the scale of capital required for AI creates concentration risks for debt investors, both across sectors and within individual companies.
Unlike shareholders, who can benefit from a company’s growth, lenders have limited value because their returns are mostly just interest and principal payments, he said.
There will be more equity needed in this space to meet this huge demand.
John Gray
President & COO, Blackstone Inc.
Speaking on the same panel, Pimco CEO Emmanuel Roman warned investors that the scale of AI financing could prove “too much” for the market to absorb.
Roman said AI-related capital spending could reach about $10 trillion over the next five years, according to estimates by Atlantic General CEO Bill Ford. He added that about $550 billion in AI loans have been issued in various forms so far this year.
Even with a mix of equity and debt financing, the amount needed would be “huge,” Roman said, comparing it to the roughly $20 trillion global corporate bond market.
“At some point, it’s going to be too much,” he said.
Global data center demand will require about $8.5 trillion in capital spending over the next five years, Goldman Sachs wrote in the report there.
Gray said Financing buildout requires a combination of public markets, banks and private capital, with companies increasingly turning to structured transactions to limit the amount of debt they take on. Cash generated by hyperscalers will also fund a portion of the spend, he said.
“That creativity is needed because the scale of the capital is so large,” Gray said.
Despite these funding challenges, Gray remains bullish on AI infrastructure, saying the demand for computing power is “running ahead of supply.”
Spending on AI models at Blackstone’s portfolio companies has grown 20-fold over the past year as businesses see financial benefits from uses including coding, customer engagement and content creation, he said.
Meeting expectations remains difficult, however, as secure sites, permits, chips, power and capital become more challenging, according to Gray.