Bitcoin miners are becoming AI landlords. Here's how far each one has actually gotten.

By Dennis Singleton · Markets Writer · July 14, 2026

Key points

Eight bitcoin miners, IREN, TeraWulf (WULF), Hut 8 (HUT), Cipher (CIFR), Core Scientific (CORZ), Applied Digital (APLD), HIVE Digital (HIVE) and CleanSpark (CLSK), are all pitching the same pivot: the cheap power and big buildings built for mining bitcoin also work for AI data centers.
They are not equally far along. IREN and TeraWulf already have AI revenue and multi-billion-dollar hyperscaler contracts running. Hut 8, Cipher and Applied Digital have signed tens of billions in AI leases that mostly have not started billing yet. CleanSpark still earns almost all of its money from mining bitcoin.
A signed contract is not the same thing as revenue. Several of these stocks have announced AI deals worth $10 billion or more while still reporting quarterly revenue that is mostly, or entirely, bitcoin mining.
A signed lease does not protect against local politics. TeraWulf found this out in July 2026 when New York paused new data center permits for up to a year, a policy that directly affects its own Lake Mariner campus in the state.

Bitcoin jumped again today, and a stock screener sorted by "bitcoin miners" would show a wall of green. But treating these eight stocks as one basket is exactly the mistake that costs people money. Half of this group barely needs bitcoin's price anymore. The other half still lives and dies by it. Here is how to tell which is which.

Why a bitcoin miner would even want to do this

A bitcoin mine is, physically, a warehouse full of specialized computers plugged into cheap electricity, usually with heavy-duty cooling. An AI data center is, physically, the same thing: racks of specialized computers (GPUs instead of mining rigs) plugged into cheap electricity with heavy-duty cooling. The buildings, the power contracts and the cooling infrastructure a miner already owns are close to exactly what an AI company needs to rent. That overlap is the entire trade. A miner that owns 300 megawatts of cheap power in Texas does not have to build an AI business from nothing, it has to convert one.

The two that are already there: IREN and TeraWulf

IREN, formerly Iris Energy, has gone the furthest. It signed a five-year, roughly $9.7 billion deal to rent Nvidia (NVDA) GB300 computing capacity to Microsoft (MSFT), backed by about $5.8 billion in GPU purchases from Dell (DELL), and added a separate $3.4 billion AI cloud contract with Nvidia itself. The company is worth roughly $14 billion, enough that it recently signed the richest jersey patch deal in North American pro sports, over $50 million a year to put its name on Golden State Warriors jerseys.

TeraWulf (WULF) made the other headline deal in this group: a 20-year lease with Anthropic worth roughly $19 billion, announced in July 2026 and backed by a $3.5 billion debt raise to fund the buildout at its Kentucky site. Both IREN and TeraWulf have shown the same pattern when the news hits: the stock spikes hard, gives most of it back within a day or two, then tends to move with the rest of the AI infrastructure group rather than on its own.

The huge-backlog, not-yet-billing group: Hut 8, Cipher, Applied Digital

Hut 8 (HUT) has the single largest contracted backlog in the group, two 15-year leases worth a combined $16.8 billion (up to $42.8 billion if renewal options get exercised), including a $9.8 billion Nvidia-spec data center in Texas that sent the stock up nearly 30% the day it was announced. But Hut 8's actual revenue today is still overwhelmingly bitcoin mining, run through its majority-owned subsidiary American Bitcoin Corp, a company it formed with Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr.'s data center business. Analysts don't expect the AI leases to show up in real revenue until 2027.

Cipher (CIFR) has locked in hyperscaler names most of this group would want: a roughly $3.8 billion, 10-year hosting deal with Fluidstack (with Google backstopping more than $1.7 billion of it) and a $5.5 billion, 15-year lease with Amazon Web Services, part of about $11.4 billion in total contracted revenue. Cipher is actively winding down its bitcoin mining site by site to make room, but its reported revenue is still mostly the mining business it is retiring, since AI rent has barely started.

Applied Digital (APLD) works a little differently. It does not mine bitcoin itself, it hosts other miners' equipment and now leases data center capacity to AI companies instead. It has three leases with CoreWeave (CRWV) worth about $11 billion combined, plus a separate $5 billion deal with an unnamed hyperscaler, and is spinning off its GPU cloud unit into a separate company. Like Hut 8 and Cipher, most of that contracted value has not turned into quarterly revenue yet.

Already crossed over: Core Scientific

Core Scientific (CORZ) is a useful middle case. Its hosting revenue from CoreWeave, $77.5 million in the first quarter of 2026, already outgrew its bitcoin mining revenue, $30.1 million the same quarter. That relationship survived a rocky patch: CoreWeave tried to acquire Core Scientific outright in 2025, shareholders voted the deal down, and the companies now operate as separate businesses under a continuing hosting contract instead. An exclusivity clause tying Core Scientific to CoreWeave on its newer campuses expired in early 2026, and the company says other hyperscalers have already come calling.

Real but still small: HIVE Digital

HIVE Digital (HIVE) is a hydro-powered miner running on cheap power in Sweden, Canada and Paraguay that grew mining revenue 158% to $297.8 million in its most recent fiscal year. Its AI arm, called BUZZ HPC, is an official Nvidia cloud partner and signed a $220 million sovereign-AI GPU deal, but it only generated $19.5 million, about 6% of the company's total revenue. Management is targeting a $200 million AI run-rate by March 2027. The pivot is real and growing fast, it is just still small next to the mining business that pays HIVE's bills today.

Barely started: CleanSpark

CleanSpark (CLSK) is the clearest example of a miner that has not made this pivot in any meaningful way yet. It still earns nearly all of its revenue from bitcoin mining. When this whole group rallies on AI infrastructure sentiment, CleanSpark is consistently one of the names left out, which is itself a useful tell: if a stock in this group is not moving with the rest on an AI-driven day, it is usually the one still mining bitcoin for a living.

The one thing to check before assuming any of these is "an AI stock"

The gap between a signed contract and actual revenue is the whole story in this sector right now. Hut 8's backlog is enormous and its AI revenue is not expected until 2027. Cipher and Applied Digital are in a similar spot. Before treating any headline dollar figure as current earnings, check the same two numbers: how much of last quarter's actual revenue came from AI hosting versus bitcoin mining, and when management says the rest of the backlog is scheduled to start billing. A $10 billion lease is real, but it is not the same thing as $10 billion showing up on an income statement.

What to watch

Bitcoin's own price still matters here, since the miners furthest from an AI pivot, CleanSpark and to a lesser extent HIVE, remain sensitive to it. But for IREN, TeraWulf, Cipher, Hut 8 and Applied Digital, the bigger swing factor going forward is whether their AI contracts actually convert into recurring revenue on schedule, not what bitcoin does on any given day.

There is also a regulatory risk here that a signed lease does not protect against. TeraWulf's Lake Mariner campus sits in New York, and in July 2026 the state paused new data center permits for up to a year, a policy that applies directly to that site. The stock fell harder than the rest of this group the day it happened. The same thing could happen anywhere a state or city decides a project's power or water use has become a problem. A contract with a hyperscaler is only as good as the government's willingness to let the building keep running.

Sources

Company investor relations releases and SEC filings for IREN, TeraWulf, Hut 8, Cipher, Core Scientific, Applied Digital and HIVE Digital, 2025-2026
Our earlier coverage, IREN bought the Warriors' jersey patch
Our earlier coverage, TeraWulf's $19 billion Anthropic lease
Our earlier coverage, HIVE Digital's AI pivot
Our earlier coverage, why this whole group trades together

This is general market commentary and opinion, not investment advice. Contract values, revenue splits and market caps change as companies report new results; figures here reflect the most recent public disclosures as of mid-July 2026. Always do your own research and consider speaking with a licensed financial professional before making any investment decision.

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Frequently asked questions

Which bitcoin miners are pivoting to AI data centers?

IREN, TeraWulf (WULF), Hut 8 (HUT), Cipher (CIFR), Core Scientific (CORZ), Applied Digital (APLD) and HIVE Digital (HIVE) have all signed AI hosting or leasing deals. CleanSpark (CLSK) is the exception, it still earns almost all of its revenue from bitcoin mining.

Which bitcoin miner has pivoted to AI the furthest?

IREN and TeraWulf are furthest along. IREN has a roughly $9.7 billion Microsoft deal and a $3.4 billion Nvidia contract already running, and TeraWulf has a $19 billion, 20-year lease with Anthropic. Both already generate real AI-related revenue, not just signed contracts.

Why do bitcoin miners have an advantage in building AI data centers?

A bitcoin mine and an AI data center are physically similar: warehouses full of specialized computers plugged into cheap power with heavy cooling. Miners that already own that infrastructure can convert it to host AI GPUs instead of mining rigs, rather than building an AI business from scratch.

Does a big AI contract mean a bitcoin miner's revenue is now mostly AI?

Not necessarily. Hut 8, Cipher and Applied Digital have all signed AI leases worth $10 billion or more, but most of that has not started billing yet, so their reported quarterly revenue is still mostly or entirely bitcoin mining. Core Scientific is the exception, its AI hosting revenue from CoreWeave already exceeds its mining revenue.

Is there a regulatory risk to bitcoin miners becoming AI data centers?

Yes. A signed lease does not protect a project from local government decisions. TeraWulf found this out in July 2026 when New York paused new data center permits for up to a year, a policy that applies directly to its own Lake Mariner campus in the state. The same could happen anywhere a state or city decides a project uses too much power or water.

Dennis Singleton · Markets Writer

Dennis Singleton has followed the markets closely for years and still finds them genuinely fascinating. He writes about stocks, AI, and semiconductors in plain language, cuts through the hype, and is straight about the risks as well as the upside. He does this because he wants readers to win.