The Pythia, the Oracle of Delphi, was known for ambiguous prophecies.
Divinely possessed by Apollo, the Pythia would utter prophecies in a trance-like state, leaving an attendant priest to interpret her musings.
Some 2,600 years after the Oracle was last consulted, her ambiguous legacy lives on in the most unlikely of places: corporate borrowing plans.
Investment grade companies are known for their often ambiguous funding plans, replete with limited visibility on how much needs to be raised in a given year.
Of course, analysts can dive through earning calls and reports to attempt to glean some sort of insight into what needs to be raised. But doing so can, at times, be just as effective as ornithomancy.
But this week, the modern day Oracle, the US tech giant, showed that being upfront and clear about what you want to raise is the best policy.
The US hyperscaler allayed market fears of a flood of bond issuance to fund its huge AI capex plans by releasing a funding plan statement ahead of hitting the markets.
The statement calmed market fears that much of this year's AI capex will be funded in the debt markets and that the borrower would become a large and regular issuer.
Before Sunday’s statement, which stated only $45bn-$50bn of cash would be raised across debt and equity instruments, analysts had anticipated a lower level of funding. Analysts at CreditSights, for instance, expected roughly $35bn would need to be raised.
However, despite revealing a higher than expected funding plan, the market responded positively to Oracle’s crystal clarity, which stated only half the volume would be raised in the debt markets and that Oracle would do that with a single deal. The hyperscaler’s spreads tightened in response.
The AI capex arms race leaves issuers facing potential annual funding programmes comparable to a medium-sized European sovereign. In fact, the $25bn raised by Oracle this week is roughly three times the annual funding need of Greece.
And it isn't just large borrowing amounts that hyperscalers and sovereigns should have in common. Governments — indeed the entire SSA market — prides itself on its predictability and clear communication to investors about its needs; no alarms and no surprises.
They argue that it helps investors clear the decks to take on new bonds, getting the biggest number of buyers to make the most space in their portfolios when it is needed.
Contrast and compare with fellow hyperscalers Alphabet, Meta and Microsoft, which unveiled mass capex plans in their latest results, but gave no straightforward suggestion of how much they will rely on bond markets for the cash.
What the other hyperscalers could learn from Oracle is that sometimes being open about your plans is best.
Don't surprise the market with $25bn on a Monday morning — telegraph it.