GPU systems are bought months before they run. NVIDIA's annual report for the year to January 2026 says the company has experienced lead times of more than 12 months for certain supply, and that it has paid premiums, provided deposits and entered long-term supply agreements and capacity commitments to secure future supply [9]. At 25 January 2026, its outstanding inventory purchase and long-term supply and capacity obligations stood at $95.2 billion [9]. The same report warns that publicly announced intentions to buy its products are often non-binding [9].
A forward purchase agreement turns an intention into an obligation. Buyer and seller agree today on the grade, quantity, price and delivery month of GPU systems, and the systems change hands later. This explainer covers what the term means, how such an agreement differs from a futures contract, how the grade is written, how deposits and bonds work, and how power and space are reserved on the same calendar.
What a forward purchase agreement means
A forward purchase agreement, also called a forward contract, fixes now the terms of a purchase delivered later, including the price or the way it is set. The Federal Reserve Board's manual on trading activities describes forwards as contracts "in which a buyer agrees to purchase from a seller a specified product at a specified price for delivery at a specified future time" [22]. The CFTC glossary lists the contract as a forward contract and as a cash forward sale [3]. It defines a forward contract as a cash transaction in which a commercial buyer and seller agree upon delivery of a specified quality and quantity of goods at a specified future date [3]. Its terms may be more personalized than those of standardized futures, and the price may be agreed in advance or determined at the time of delivery [3].
The contract binds both sides. The Call Report glossary of the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council (FFIEC) defines forward contracts as agreements that obligate two parties to purchase and sell a financial instrument, foreign currency or commodity at a specified price, with delivery and settlement at a specified future date [23]. Such a contract can be terminated, other than by receipt of the underlying asset, only by agreement of both buyer and seller [23]. The Federal Reserve manual adds that forwards are individually negotiated between counterparties, so they can be customized to the parties' needs, and that they can be arranged for almost any product [22].
Futures contracts, by contrast, are standardized forward contracts traded on organized exchanges [23], and a futures position can end by offset, with no delivery [3]. A forward purchase agreement is a private contract settled by delivering the goods [3, 23]. For GPU systems, the goods are configured systems of a written grade, delivered in a named month to a named place.
Forward or futures
The two instruments share a time gap between agreement and delivery. Almost everything else differs.
| Bilateral forward purchase agreement | Exchange-traded futures contract | |
|---|---|---|
| Parties | A named buyer and seller | Counterparties through a clearing organization |
| Terms | Negotiated per order: grade, quantity, price, delivery month and place | Standardized by the exchange: contract grades, size and delivery months |
| Ending | Physical delivery | Delivery or offset, or cash settlement where the contract provides it |
| Credit risk | Each party bears the risk that the other defaults | Guaranteed against default by the clearing organization |
| Collateral | Deposits and bonds set in the agreement | Margin, marked to market each trading session |
| Venue | A private contract | A designated contract market |
The futures descriptions and the forward definition follow the CFTC glossary [3]. Deposits and bonds are covered below.
U.S. law draws the line in the Commodity Exchange Act. The term "future delivery" does not include any sale of a cash commodity for deferred shipment or delivery, and the definition of a swap excludes any sale of a nonfinancial commodity for deferred shipment or delivery, "so long as the transaction is intended to be physically settled" [1]. In their 2012 rule defining swaps, the CFTC and the SEC restated the CFTC's historical view that the primary purpose of a forward contract "is to transfer ownership of the commodity and not to transfer solely its price risk" [2]. Intent to deliver is judged on the facts and circumstances of the whole transaction [2].
Whether a particular agreement falls inside the forward exclusion is a legal question for the parties and their counsel.
The grade carries the contract
Futures markets solve comparability with a basis grade: the standard grade of a commodity, with discounts or premiums, called differentials, for grades or locations below or above it [3]. A forward agreement for GPU systems can use the same idea in a form suited to configured hardware. It starts from a reference grade, such as an HGX B200 8-GPU system, and lists every difference from it in CPU, memory, networking and certification.
Cooling is a difference large enough to make a separate grade. NVIDIA's DGX B200 is a 10-rack-unit, air-cooled system with an estimated maximum power of 14.3 kW, and NVIDIA's planning guidance puts two systems in a rack in a typical deployment [12]. Supermicro sells HGX B200 systems in both forms: its liquid-cooled 4U system fits 8 systems and 64 GPUs in a 42U or 48U rack, while up to 4 of its air-cooled 10U systems fit in a rack [14]. The same GPUs need different racks, different cooling plant and different power per rack. Power input can differ too: NVIDIA's DGX B300 comes in a version with AC power supplies and a version that draws 54 V DC from a rack busbar [13]. An agreement that names a grade without these differences leaves the buyer to discover them at delivery.
Deposits, escrow and bonds
One structure secures both sides. At signing, the buyer pays a deposit to an independent escrow agent, and the balance is due at delivery. Escrow is an arrangement in which money or other assets are deposited with a neutral third party, who holds them until conditions in an escrow agreement are satisfied and releases them only on the parties' agreed instructions [6].
The seller posts a performance bond to back its obligation to deliver. The instrument is familiar from construction: U.S. federal law requires a performance bond with a surety before a federal construction contract of more than $100,000 is awarded [7], a threshold the Federal Acquisition Regulation applies at $150,000 [8].
The phrase means something else in futures. There, "performance bond" is another name for margin, the money or collateral deposited with a broker or clearing organization [3]. A forward agreement's bond protects the buyer against non-delivery. Futures margin is collateral that follows the price: gains and losses on each position are calculated at the end of each trading session and added to or subtracted from the account [3].
Contract law adds a backstop. Under the Uniform Commercial Code, when reasonable grounds for insecurity arise about either party's performance, the other may demand adequate assurance in writing, and failure to provide it within a reasonable time not exceeding thirty days is a repudiation [5].
Delivery months and late delivery
A forward agreement names a delivery month and a place. Public compute contracts show how delivery obligations are written. In September 2025, Nebius disclosed an agreement to provide Microsoft with dedicated GPU capacity in tranches during 2025 and 2026, with a total contract value of about $17.4 billion through 2031 [10]. If Nebius misses an agreed delivery date after a grace period and cannot provide alternative capacity, Microsoft may terminate that tranche, and the agreement includes liquidated damages for late delivery [10]. In July 2026, Nebius said it had delivered the latest planned tranche and remained on track with the contracted schedule [11].
That agreement sells GPU capacity as a service. The delivery terms carry over to hardware: a named date, a grace period, a remedy for lateness and a right to substitute.
Power and space on the same calendar
Systems without power are inventory. A data-center capacity agreement reserves power and space before the hardware arrives. CBRE quotes wholesale colocation asking rates per kW per month, for requirements of 250 kW and above [20]. The examples below use blocks of 250 kW, 500 kW and 1 MW.
The market for that capacity is tight. CBRE reported primary-market vacancy in North America of 1.4% in the first half of 2026, with 7,481 MW under construction and more than 80% of it already preleased [19]. Its report on the second half of 2025 noted that sites offering power access within 18 to 36 months for greenfield development are highly sought after [20].
Rack power sets how much a block holds. At about 120 kW per GB200 NVL72 rack, a 250 kW block holds 2 racks, a 500 kW block 4 and a 1 MW block 8 [15]. At up to 142 kW per GB300 NVL72 rack, the counts are 1, 3 and 7 [18]. At 14.3 kW per DGX B200 system, they are 17, 34 and 69 [12]. These counts are derived from the vendor figures and leave no allowance for networking, storage or cooling equipment. NVIDIA specifies a scalable unit of 8 DGX GB200 racks at a thermal design power of 1.2 MW [16], so a 1 MW block holds less than one such unit as NVIDIA specifies it.
Read the full report
The full report, with the legal background, the grade model, worked sizing examples and the numbered sources behind every figure here, is available as a PDF.