CoreWeave Drops 6% as Debt Worries Linger; IREN Falls 4%, Nebius Slips

Debt worries are back at the center of the AI cloud trade, and the most leveraged name in the group is taking the hardest hit. CoreWeave (NASDAQ:CRWV) stock is off 6%, recently at $65.77, leaving it down 7% year to date (YTD).

Meanwhile, shares of IREN Limited (NASDAQ:IREN) are down 4% to $29.30, a smaller slide than CoreWeave stock. That move leaves IREN stock down 22% YTD, a larger loss than CoreWeave stock has posted.

Nebius Group (NASDAQ:NBIS | NBIS Price Prediction) stock is down 2% to $183.95, the smallest decline of the three. Even after the drop, Nebius shares remain up 120% YTD, far ahead of CoreWeave and IREN stock.

Bond Slide Keeps CoreWeave Under Pressure

The selling traces back to Wednesday. That was when CoreWeave stock dropped after Bloomberg reported that the company’s unsecured bonds had fallen to levels read as a sign of financial strain. Those debt worries haven’t faded, and CoreWeave shares are extending the decline.

In its most recent quarterly report, for Q2 2026, CoreWeave showed total liabilities of $72.05 billion and a debt-to-equity ratio of 8.94. Its interest expense jumped to $640 million in the quarter from $267 million a year earlier. CoreWeave’s filing noted heavy reliance on continued capital market access as a key risk.

To fund its expansion, CoreWeave relies on secured and unsecured debt, convertible bonds and equity placements. That expansion pushed capital expenditures to $6.42 billion in Q2, leaving free cash flow at negative $5.74 billion. However, CoreWeave generated $679 million in operating cash flow, up from negative $251 million a year earlier.

Leverage Ranks CoreWeave, IREN and Nebius

IREN builds and owns its campuses across North America, Europe and Asia Pacific, converting former digital-asset mining sites into AI cloud infrastructure. On Thursday, IREN proposed Redbank, a second Australian campus still in preliminary planning without a secured grid connection or financing.

Nebius runs a full-stack AI cloud platform and has leaned on stock sales and convertible securities rather than conventional borrowing. In the first half of 2026, it raised $4.34 billion from convertible notes, $2.85 billion from treasury share sales and $2 billion from pre-funded warrants.

Cloud and Tech Funds Barely Budge

Selling in CoreWeave stock hasn’t spread across the wider cloud group. The First Trust Cloud Computing ETF (NASDAQ:SKYY) is flat at $166.62, even though CoreWeave made up 3% of the fund’s net assets as of June 30. The broader mix is absorbing the hit. Its networking, software and storage holdings serve as a reminder that the AI expansion runs on more than chips (we covered seven of the power, cooling and networking names behind it in a free report).

Large-cap tech is only slightly lower, with the Invesco QQQ Trust (NASDAQ:QQQ) down 0.1%. Index membership links the two, since CoreWeave was selected for inclusion in the NASDAQ 100, the benchmark the fund tracks.

Financing Terms Hold the Key for CoreWeave

CoreWeave’s bull case rests on contracts signed before capacity comes online. As of June 30, CoreWeave reported a revenue backlog of $104 billion, and it added more than $25 billion in net new customer commitments early in Q3 2026. Michael Intrator was CoreWeave’s CEO during the Q2 release. He stated, “CoreWeave reached an important inflection point this quarter as our scale began to translate into expanding operating leverage.”

Distressed bond prices form CoreWeave’s bear case, putting a market value on the financing risk the company flagged in its own filing. With CoreWeave’s interest coverage at -0.04, its operating income falls short of its interest costs. Investors are best served by limiting their CoreWeave stock exposure until the company’s bonds stabilize enough to make new funding affordable.

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