The nuclear energy rally has hit a critical failure point recently, as reports revealed significant delays in Oracle's massive AI infrastructure plans.
- OKLO stock is slipping. See the chart and price action here.
Shares of Oklo Inc. (NYSE:OKLO), NuScale Power Corp. (NYSE:SMR) and Nano Nuclear Energy (NASDAQ:NNE) sold off as Wall Street digested the negative headlines on Oracle and OpenAI's “Stargate” supercomputer project.
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Other energy companies, including Constellation Energy Corp. (NASDAQ:CEG) and Bloom Energy Corp. (NYSE:BE), were trading lower as well.
Last week, reports surfaced that Oracle pushed back the delivery of some critical data centers due to shortages in skilled labor and essential materials.
On Wednesday, the Financial Times reported that Blue Owl Capital has decided not to support a $10 billion deal for Oracle's next planned data center for OpenAI.
The news comes as Oracle faces increased concerns over mounting debt and massive AI spending. People familiar with the matter reportedly said Oracle has yet to find someone to take Blue Owl's place in backing the planned facility.
For months, the “AI energy trade” was fueled by the high-octane narrative that hyperscalers like Oracle and Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ:MSFT) were in a desperate sprint to build gigawatt-scale data centers and needed advanced nuclear reactors to power them.
The long-term goal remains the same, but the timeline has been stretched and for a pre-revenue sector burning cash, a one-year delay is a lifetime.
The stocks of pre-revenue players like Oklo and Nano Nuclear were priced for perfection, trading on an “urgency premium” that assumed signed power purchase agreements were imminent.
Investors are now rapidly unplugging from the speculative sector because if the data centers aren’t being built yet, the micro-reactors meant to power them won’t be ordered yet.
The nuclear renaissance may still be coming, but as Oracle's delays just proved, it will arrive on a construction schedule, not a software update timeline.
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