CoreWeave Sales Rise To $3.7 Billion — But Its Interest Bill Outstrips Operating Profit
The AI cloud company raised its spending floor to $37 billion as quarterly losses widened to $709 million.
CoreWeave, which supplies cloud computing for AI, increased third-quarter sales to $3.7 billion from $1.4 billion a year earlier, but its $846 million net interest bill exceeded its $207 million operating profit. Results released with Tuesday's SEC filing showed a $709 million net loss, up from $110 million, as the company raised its infrastructure-spending forecast.
Interest Overtakes The Operating Gains
CoreWeave earned more from its operations: operating income rose from $52 million a year earlier, and its operating margin increased to 6% from 4%. Net interest expense, however, climbed from $310 million, while the loss per share widened to $1.27 from $0.22.
The adjusted figures also gave a mixed picture. Adjusted operating income reached $379 million, against $217 million a year earlier, but the corresponding margin fell to 10% from 16%. Adjusted net losses widened to $529 million from $41 million.
Michael Intrator, CoreWeave's co-founder, chairman and chief executive officer, said adjusted operating margins reached double digits “a quarter ahead of plan.” That milestone measured progress against management's schedule, rather than an improvement over the year-earlier margin.
The company now forecasts fourth-quarter interest expense of $1.05 billion–$1.15 billion.
Earlier Delivery, A Higher Spending Floor
CoreWeave raised its capital-spending outlook to $37 billion–$39 billion for 2026, from $35 billion–$39 billion. Management attributed the higher minimum to plans to deploy infrastructure and deliver capacity to customers sooner.
Equipment and software purchases used $9.4 billion during the quarter, compared with $3.3 billion a year earlier. Operations generated $2.0 billion in cash, up from $1.7 billion; net debt issuance proceeds were $10.3 billion, and debt repayments were $2.3 billion.
The financing burden has already weighed on the stock. Shares fell more than 40% over the past month amid concerns about AI financing and CoreWeave's debt-heavy balance sheet.
In September, CoreWeave priced $3.7 billion of convertible notes—debt that can convert into stock—after increasing the planned offering from $3.0 billion. Tuesday's release reported that the upsized offering raised approximately $4.2 billion and that CoreWeave established a program to sell up to 35 million Class A shares into the market.
Intrator pointed to customer-backed financing and operating cash flow as funding sources, alongside “approximately $9 billion in customer prepayments and deposits expected in the next three months alone.”
Capacity Must Turn Into Sales
CoreWeave's customers include enterprises, AI labs and technology companies that use its computing, storage, networking and software to train and run AI models. Customers generally purchase capacity through multi-year take-or-pay contracts, committing to pay for capacity, or use pay-as-you-go access. Its software offerings include developer tools from Weights & Biases.
Active power capacity exceeded 1.7 gigawatts, double the footprint at the year's start, with more than 4.6 gigawatts under contract. CoreWeave continues to expect active capacity above 1.85 gigawatts at year-end.
Management raised its annual revenue forecast to $13.0 billion–$13.3 billion and its adjusted operating-income outlook by 26% at the midpoint. It also raised its year-end annualized revenue pace forecast to $20 billion–$21 billion, a measure calculated by multiplying the final month's revenue by 12, rather than a forecast of full-year sales.
CoreWeave's approximately $132.5 billion revenue backlog estimates future sales from committed customer contracts. Turning those commitments into revenue depends on delivering the infrastructure and making the services available.
Sources
- 8-K Filing — CoreWeave, Inc. (CRWV) — SEC EDGAR
- Exhibit coreweave3q26earningspress.htm — CoreWeave, Inc. 8-K exhibit — SEC EDGAR
- CoreWeave (CRWV) Q3 earnings report 2026 — CNBC
- CoreWeave stock pops as Q3 revenue beats estimates, company raises full-year outlook — Yahoo Finance
- CoreWeave Reports Strong Third Quarter 2026 Results — businesswire.com
- 8-K filed 2026-09-22 — CoreWeave, Inc. (earlier disclosure) — SEC EDGAR
