Riot Platforms has leased its entire Corsicana, Texas campus — 910 megawatts of critical IT capacity — to Anthropic under a 15-year deal Riot values at about $28 billion, and Anthropic’s name only became public because Riot’s quarterly filing says it outright. Why it matters: it is one of the largest single-site compute leases an AI lab has signed, and it locks in Anthropic’s Texas capacity in phases running through 2028.
November 5, 2026
What happened
Riot announced the lease alongside its third-quarter results on November 4, 2026, describing the tenant only as a leading frontier AI lab. The 15-year triple-net powered land lease covers the whole Corsicana campus, a contiguous 332-acre parcel in Navarro County, Texas, with 910 MW of critical IT capacity. Riot puts the total contract value at about $28 billion over the initial term — roughly $1.8 billion in average annual rent — rising to about $54 billion if Anthropic exercises both five-year extension options. Chief executive Jason Les called it the largest lease in Riot’s history.
Riot’s Form 10-Q, filed the same day, names the tenant as Anthropic PBC. According to the filing, a Riot subsidiary signed the lease on October 28, and it became binding on November 4 after Riot’s board approved it and outside consultants signed off on the technical specifications. The filing uses the same “Frontier AI Lab” label for the tenant of Riot’s 191 MW Rockdale lease signed in August — which means Anthropic accounts for 1,101 MW of the 1,151 MW Riot has now contracted, with AMD holding the remaining 50 MW and total contracted data center revenue of about $38 billion.
The terms: Riot builds the shell, Anthropic brings the computers
Under the triple-net structure, Riot provides the land, power infrastructure and powered pads, while Anthropic procures, owns and operates the modular compute equipment and pays utility and operating costs. Base rent starts at $130 per kilowatt per month and rises 3% a year. Capacity arrives in three phases: 400 MW in September 2027, 200 MW in January 2028 and 310 MW in July 2028.
Riot estimates the capital requirement at about $6 million per IT megawatt, or $5.5 billion overall. The financing detail getting the most attention: Riot agreed to reimburse Anthropic up to $4 million per megawatt — about $3.6 billion across the campus — for the data center modules the tenant installs, provided Riot can raise the money on terms it finds acceptable. If that financing is not available, the filing says Riot instead gives Anthropic rent credits that amortize the amount plus interest at 12% per year over the rest of the initial term. Riot says it expects to fund the reimbursements with non-recourse project debt and does not currently expect to issue equity for the project.
Why it matters
For Anthropic, this is long-horizon capacity on a single campus: take-or-pay rent on 910 MW, delivered in stages through mid-2028, with extension options that could stretch the commitment to 25 years and $54 billion. Combined with the Rockdale lease, Anthropic is now the anchor tenant for more than 1.1 gigawatts of Riot-built capacity in Texas.
For Riot, the deal completes a visible pivot. The company has been selling the bitcoin it mines to fund the data center build — it sold 20,264 BTC for about $1.5 billion in the first nine months of 2026 and ended September holding 2,418 BTC — and its filing says it expects to keep selling substantially all of what it mines. The test from here is execution: whether lenders fund the Corsicana build on terms that keep the 12% fallback clause on paper only, and whether Riot hits the 2027–2028 delivery dates, since late delivery earns Anthropic escalating rent credits and, past 270 days, the right to walk away from a phase.
Frequently asked questions
Who is the tenant in Riot’s Corsicana lease?
Anthropic PBC. Riot’s results release called the tenant only a “leading Frontier AI Lab,” but Riot’s Form 10-Q names Anthropic directly.
How big is the deal?
910 MW of critical IT capacity on a 332-acre campus, over a 15-year initial term Riot values at about $28 billion, or about $54 billion if both five-year extensions are exercised.
When does the capacity arrive?
In three phases: 400 MW in September 2027, 200 MW in January 2028 and 310 MW in July 2028, per Riot’s announcement.
What is the 12% clause?
Riot agreed to reimburse Anthropic up to about $3.6 billion for its data center modules. If Riot cannot raise that financing on acceptable terms, Anthropic instead receives rent credits covering the amount plus 12% annual interest.
Sources: Riot Platforms Q3 2026 results and Form 10-Q (via SEC), Bitcoin Magazine, TradingKey earnings call transcript