---
title: "Junk: what it means · The AI Compute Race · DRYBURGH"
source: https://dryburgh.com/vol1/glossary/junk
description: "Junk: The rating agencies' mark of debt safe enough for cautious buyers, written IG. Debt below the line is high yield, or junk. Chapter 10."
---

# Junk

What does “Junk” mean?

JunkSee investment grade.

[Investment grade](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/glossary/investment-grade) The rating agencies’ mark of debt safe enough for cautious buyers, written IG. Debt below the line is high yield, or junk. *Chapter 10.*

From *The AI Compute Race*. [Read the book](https://dryburgh.com/vol1#buy)

## Where the record uses it

- Scorecard indicator [Oracle 5-year credit default swap (CDS, credit protection)](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/scorecard#row-25)

## Also discussed in

- Dated test [Chapter 14, the movement downward, toward distress](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/tests#2029-9)

## Sources that use it

- Davide Barbuscia and Michael Gambale, “BlackRock Dodges AI Bond-Trading Flop After Offering Junk Yields,” Bloomberg, 27 July 2026, updated to reflect the bond having priced (in the paper’s own voice: “BlackRock Inc.’s $12.55 billion bond sale tied to a Meta Platforms Inc. data center”; “The investment-grade debt for the El Paso, Texas project was sold in an offering led by JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Morgan Stanley at a 7.534% yield, a level more common in junk bonds”; demand from “Sopaipilla Investor, a holding company tied to BlackRock that holds an 80% stake in the data center project,” reached “just $20 billion on Friday, or 1.6 times the amount of bonds for sale,” while “The average demand for bond sales this year was closer to four times the size of the offering, according to data compiled by Bloomberg News”; “a premium of about 0.4 percentage point to where a Beignet note due in 2049 trades”; the pricing spread of 2.875 percentage points on people with knowledge of the matter) [In the Sources](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/sources/press#bloomberg-blackrock-elpaso-bond-jul26)
- Katherine Schwartz and Josie Reich, “CoreWeave Woes Risk Shutting Down AI Junk Market: Credit Weekly,” Bloomberg, 17 October 2026 (“Volta ended up paying more than the 11% yield banks had initially discussed, rivaling the highest rates paid so far to finance the AI buildout”; JPMorgan and Goldman Sachs ran the $5 billion loan) [In the Sources](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/sources/press#bloomberg-credit-weekly-oct17-26)

## Related terms

- [Investment grade](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/glossary/investment-grade)

From the glossary of The AI Compute Race.

- [Campuses](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/ledger)
- [Tests](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/tests)
- [Scorecard](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/scorecard)
- [Data](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/data/releases)
- [Chapter by chapter](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/companion)
- [The record at a glance](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/observatory)
- [The machine](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/machine)
- [One campus, four futures](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/hyperion)
- [Glossary](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/glossary)
- [People](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/people)
- [Sources](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/sources)
- [Notes](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/notes)
- [Where the book was wrong](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/corrections)
- [Where its sources were wrong](https://dryburgh.com/corrections?book=vol1)
- [The Paper](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/paper)
- [Consent](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/consent)
- [Who builds and pays](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/parties)

*The AI Compute Race: Five Races, One Machine* is a book by Lee S. Dryburgh, the first volume of THE COMPUTE ECONOMY, published by Dryburgh, an imprint of Contestra OÜ, Tallinn, Estonia; its record closes on 8 November 2026.

[About the book](https://dryburgh.com/vol1)[Tell me when it is out](https://dryburgh.com/vol1#notify)