Oracle seeks payment protection amid delays for New Mexico data center

Oracle is looking to shield itself from financial penalties if its massive New Mexico data center, known as Project Jupiter, doesn’t open on schedule in 2028. The request for payment protection comes as the project faces a growing list of headaches: permit denials, environmental litigation, a credit downgrade, and construction delays that have already pushed timelines back by at least seven months. A $18 billion bet showing cracks Project Jupiter sprawls across roughly 1,400 acres in Doña Ana County near Santa Teresa, New Mexico. The plan calls for four data center buildings and an on-site microgrid, all designed to feed the compute-hungry demands of OpenAI’s AI workloads. Stack Infrastructure and BorderPlex Digital Assets are developing the site, with construction kicking off in September 2025. As of early September 2026, the project sits at approximately 26% completion, with the initial phase already running at least seven months behind schedule. The financing picture isn’t reassuring either. An $18 billion loan package arranged for the project started trading at 89 to 91 cents on the dollar by September 2026. Oracle’s credit rating took a hit too, dropping to BBB- before mid-Sep...