The company has signed a 15-year lease worth $7.0 billion Fluid stack for 245 megawatts of IT capacity at the River Bend data center campus in Louisiana.
The triple-net lease includes an annual base rent escalator of 3.0% and has a potential aggregate value of up to $17.7 billion if all three five-year renewal options are exercised.
Also read: Hut 8’s valuation becomes more attractive as Eric Jackson takes a long position and shifts heavily into AI infrastructure
Fluidstack will also receive a Right of First Offer for up to 1,000 MW of future expansion capacity, depending on the available power at the site.
Google Backstop, institutional counterparties
Googlinga subsidiary of Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG)offers a financial back-up for lease payments and continued payment obligations during the basic term of 15 years.
Hut 8 expects the lease to generate cumulative net operating income (NOI) of approximately $6.9 billion, or an average of $454 million per year.
The project is structured with leading counterparties in financing, construction and operations. JPMorgan (NYSE:JPM) And Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS) are expected to secure project-level financing of up to 85% of loan/cost, subject to definitive agreements and customary closing conditions. Jacob’s solutions (NYSE:J) acts as an EPCM partner and collaborates Vertiv Holdings (NYSE:VRT) in the provision of critical infrastructure.
Construction timeline and operations
The first data hall in River Bend is expected to be completed and operational in the second quarter of 2027. It is expected that more halls will come online in the remainder of 2027.
Hut 8 and Fluidstack also plan to enter into an Operations Services Agreement for ongoing data center operations, supported by an additional backlog from Google.
Asher GenotCEO of Hut 8, said: “River Bend reflects the strength of Hut 8’s power-first, innovation-driven development model, validated by the world-class counterparties we work with.”
Expanding the AI infrastructure nationwide
River Bend’s lease also fits within Hut 8’s broader collaboration Anthropic and Fluidstack, which aims to scale hyperscale AI infrastructure in the United States.
Within this framework, River Bend serves as an anchor project within a repeatable deployment model designed to support the rising demand for AI computing.
The partnership creates a pathway to deploy significantly more capacity outside of Louisiana as more power and sites are developed.
State partnership and economic impact
Hut 8 secured an initial 330 MW of utility capacity for River Bend through Entergy Louisiana (NYSE:ETR)with the potential to scale up another 1,000 MW.
At full buildout, the campus could be among the largest data center developments in the world and one of Louisiana’s largest private capital projects.
At the peak of construction, the project is expected to employ approximately 1,000 workers. Once operational, it is expected to support at least 75 direct jobs and 190 indirect and induced jobs in West Feliciana Parish.
Following the transaction, Hut 8 reclassified the 330 MW in River Bend as “Energy Capacity Under Construction,” bringing the total pipeline capacity across all phases to 9,520 MW.
HUT price promotion: Hut 8 shares rose 23.61% to $45.55 in premarket trading on Wednesday, according to data from Benzinga Pro.
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