Equinix Says SEC Has Ended Its Probe That Sprouted From Short-Seller’s Report
The Securities and Exchange Commission has ended its investigation into Equinix, the data center REIT said Thursday morning.
Equinix, a cornerstone of digital infrastructure with more than 270 data centers across six continents, disclosed the investigation’s conclusion in an SEC filing. The SEC is not planning to refer the investigation into alleged stock manipulation for further action, like a lawsuit, the filing says.
Equinix attracted regulatory scrutiny after Hindenburg Research, a well-known activist short-seller, released a report in March 2024 alleging the REIT was using accounting gimmicks to inflate key growth metrics.
Hindenburg accused Equinix of oversubscribing its power capacity — access to electricity has become a key chokepoint for data center operations and development — effectively promising customers power it did not have. Equinix denied the allegations.
Days after the report was released, Equinix disclosed it had received a subpoena from the enforcement division of the SEC and the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Northern District of California.
Equinix also said in the filing Thursday that it doesn’t expect any further action related to the state investigation.
The REIT didn’t respond to a request for comment Thursday morning. An SEC spokesperson declined to comment in line with its policy against confirming the existence of investigations.
A group of shareholders also sued Equinix following the short-seller report in a class-action that accused the REIT of manipulating its reported capital expenditures to boost its adjusted funds from operations, another allegation from Hindenburg.
Equinix agreed to pay $41.5M in July to resolve the case, which was heard in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.
The REIT was trading in positive territory Thursday morning but is down more than 18% from the start of the year. The stock was trading for around $850 per share just prior to the 2024 Hindenburg report.
Following the release of the research, a sell-off that lasted through April pushed the REIT’s shares down to $700, but the stock bounced back and reached its 52-week high of $994 per share in December.
Equinix posted $2.3B in third-quarter revenue, up 5% from the prior year, and an operating income of $474M, up 12% from 2024. It’s rapidly expanding as artificial intelligence investment fuels demand, with 58 projects under development around the world.
The data center giant, founded as a traditional company in 1988 before becoming a REIT in 2015, is a colocation specialist, meaning it effectively rents space and computing power on the servers inside its data centers.
The SEC brought 30% fewer enforcement actions against public companies this year compared to last, according to a report from Cornerstone Research.
A decline in enforcement is common during leadership transitions — former SEC commissioner Paul Atkins took over the top spot at the agency in April — but the shift in the last fiscal year was outside the historical ebb and flow, said Sara Gilley, one of the authors of the report.
"Even within that overall decline, the year stood out for its record highs and lows and the unusually low monetary settlements observed,” she said.
