Bitcoin mining companies are turning to AI at an accelerated pace, and the valuation of AI/HPC contract miners is significantly higher than that of pure mining companies

Comparatively, as the price of Bitcoin falls and mining yields continue to be pressured, Bitcoin mining companies that have switched to AI and high-performance computing (AI/HPC) are receiving higher valuations and more stable revenue expectations.

TerraWULF (WULF), IREN, and Cipher Digital (CIFR) shares have all more than doubled in the past year, while MARA Holdings (MARA), which switched to AI later, fell about 40% over the same period. Currently, the Bitcoin mining hash price has dropped from about 63 US dollars per PH/s in July last year to about 31.8 US dollars, causing more and more mining companies to shut down their devices, and the computing power of the Bitcoin network has also dropped from 1.14 zh/s to about 900 EH/s, a drop of about 21%.

According to CoinShares data, as of the first quarter of 2026, the average corporate value ratio of mining companies with AI/HPC contracts was about 12.3 times, while pure Bitcoin mining companies were only 5.9 times; the total number of AI/HPC contracts signed by the entire industry during the same period reached about 70 billion US dollars.

Recently, mining companies' AI transformation has further accelerated. Riot Platforms signed a 20-year lease with Anthropic last week, worth approximately $9.1 billion. The market believes that the real scarce assets of mining companies are not Bitcoin itself, but rather low-cost electricity, data center infrastructure, and large-scale computing power operation capabilities. These resources can be used for high-growth computing services such as AI.

However, pure Bitcoin mining still has room for recovery. CoinShares estimates that if the Bitcoin price returns to its all-time high of about $126,000 in October last year, the hash price may rise back to about $59/PH/s, and mining companies' profitability is expected to improve markedly.