[maxglute]

Likely pulling numbers out of their ass.

They're getting challenged on X about how parent Highflyer hedgefund with 8B AUM, aka their single digit % management fees since founding is in low 100s millions total (for all operating expenses) can sustain 1B+ of just capex, somehow got 1B+ of hardware. It's not financially possible, well not anymore since founder just met with PRC premiere whose going to unlock national compute bazooka. But the fact they just got political attention means they were operating on limited capex, the founder himself said the original batch of A100 cards represented significant gamble and shared resource with hedgefund. They simply did not have the cash for 1B+ of cards that semianalysis thinks they have, doesn't pass basic smell test.

Deepseeks paper also pretty transparent about training cost was for that run. IMO people fixate on the 6m training cost number, but really the story is a bunch of kids, from PRC universities with access to some compute is closing gap with US AI... which TBH is just as embarassing / destabilizing.