Nebius shares surge more than 50% after Microsoft deal

​​​​​​​ISTANBUL

Shares of Amsterdam-based artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure company Nebius soared more than 50% Tuesday, following a multi-billion-dollar deal with Microsoft.

Nebius announced the deal with Monday with Microsoft worth up to $19.4 billion to provide cloud computing power for AI workloads.

With investors like Nvidia and Accel, the agreement will be worth $17.4 billion to Nebius through 2031. Under the agreement, Microsoft may also purchase more processing power, increasing the value of the deal to $19.4 billion.

Amid investor enthusiasm about the purchase, Nebius shares surged 60% Monday in extended trading and continued to rise Tuesday. Additionally, shares of competitor CoreWeave increased 8% after the news.

The Nebius-Microsoft agreement indicates that there is still high demand for the potent processing hardware required to train and operate sophisticated AI systems.

Nvidia, the largest participant in the AI infrastructure market, announced last month that it anticipates sales growth for the quarter to stay above 50% due to the sustained demand for its AI chips. The company posted better-than-expected earnings and revenue for the three months through June.

During the company’s earnings call, Nvidia Chief Financial Officer Colette Kress stated that the business expects spending between $3 trillion and $4 trillion on AI infrastructure by the end of the decade.