New York, June 10, 2026, 13:47 EDT
- Fermi Inc. shares jumped roughly 24% to $6.99, changing hands more than 30 million times intraday, after talk surfaced over OpenAI’s AI infrastructure plans and drew traders to data-center builders with ready power.
- Reuters reports the Ohio project is not tied to a disclosed Fermi contract, but is a read-through trade. SB Energy, a SoftBank unit, would develop it.
- Investors want to see if Fermi gets a tenant to sign on Project Matador. In its most recent quarterly filing, the company said it still hadn’t secured any tenant agreements as of that report.
Fermi Inc. shares jumped Wednesday after news of OpenAI talks over data-center supply. Investors moved in on stocks linked to big AI power infrastructure. FRMI last traded at $6.99, up $1.37 from the last close. The stock hit $7.09 during the session. Volume cleared 30.7 million shares, much higher than usual trading levels.
No word from Fermi. Instead, Reuters reported OpenAI is talking about leasing a proposed 10-gigawatt data-center campus on federal land in Ohio. Nvidia could provide financial support, according to The Information. One gigawatt is one billion watts, a common measure in AI for the power needed to run large chip clusters.
The difference here is key. SB Energy, a SoftBank arm, would build the Ohio campus, not Fermi. Reuters said it could not confirm The Information’s report, and OpenAI and Nvidia did not respond to requests for comment outside regular hours. The stock reaction is running on speculation and scarcity, not on news of a Fermi lease.
Citizens lit up the trade. The company told investors the OpenAI report backs its wider push for large, tenant-heavy data center campuses, which might give Fermi a better shot at winning the first big lease at its planned 11-gigawatt natural-gas complex. The pitch: AI players are trying to lock down power before securing compute space.
OpenAI’s report calls out a financing setup getting attention from investors. Reuters reported the planned Ohio site might carry a price tag of at least $500 billion, with OpenAI running the gear on a 20-year lease. Nvidia would deliver hardware and backstop financing. If suppliers start backing these projects in this way, developers with approved power sites could see valuations jump.
Fermi is sticking to that pitch. In its most recent Form 10-Q, the company called Project Matador in Carson County, Texas an on-demand energy generation and AI infrastructure campus with about 11 gigawatts of capacity, potentially expanding to around 17 gigawatts if more land deals go through and permits come in. The report said the campus would include powered shells—data-center buildings with power infrastructure in place and ready for tenant gear.
The company is moving ahead on permits. Fermi got final sign-off from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality for a 6-gigawatt clean-air permit back on February 25. It also put in a new application on March 27 covering another 5 gigawatts. If regulators sign off, that would clear the way for all 11 gigawatts on the site to run on gas.
The filing also lays out why the stock reacts so sharply to news about tenants. Fermi expects nearly all of its revenue will depend on lease rental income from big hyperscaler tenants, which are major cloud or AI firms, but said it hadn’t started making revenue as of March 31.
The company said in its quarterly filing it hasn’t signed agreements with tenants. Its deal with Texas Tech University System for the ground lease includes a notice-to-proceed trigger, which depends on signing a Phase 1 tenant lease covering at least 200 megawatts of capacity by December 31, 2026.
Traders may be getting ahead of themselves with Wednesday’s rally. Reuters hasn’t verified the OpenAI Ohio talks and Fermi isn’t listed as a participant. Fermi also has no operating revenue. The firm said Phase 0 and Phase 1 capex could total more than $3 billion. Across all phases, total capital needs might hit $70 billion to $90 billion.
Fermi is a long way off its IPO price. Reuters said the company sold shares at $21 in its 2025 debut. After Wednesday’s gain, the stock was still trading at about a third of that.
Eyes are now on Project Matador. Investors are looking for a binding lease, a tenant prepay, or fresh financing at the project level. Fermi has already warned that it will face a liquidity squeeze without a tenant lined up and more capital.
