Bitcoin miner divergence in the 2026 post-halving cycle

Revenue growth masks declining hashrate

Marathon Digital reported $254.47 million in revenue for Q3, a 93.3% increase year-over-year. This revenue growth stems from a $113 million change in the fair value of digital assets. The company mined 22.5 BTC per day in Q3, a decline from 23.3 BTC per day in Q3 2024. Marathon holds 52,850 BTC in its treasury, and it has loaned or pledged 17,357 BTC as collateral to seek yield. The company maintains a debt load of $851 million and an operating margin of -75.51%. A current ratio of 0.54 indicates liquidity challenges, while a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.55 reflects moderate leverage. Core Scientific warns of sector instability, having declared bankruptcy after struggling with $1.3 billion in liabilities. Greenidge undergoes a restructuring process to manage its $218 million in debt. Analysts set a target price of $24.60 for Marathon, though the forward P/E of 42.81 suggests expectations of declining earnings. The company also faces volatility with a beta of 5.62.

Texas energy plays and the AI pivot

Riot Platforms uses the Texas energy market to generate income through power credits and demand response. The company earned $33.7 million last year for electricity it did not use. In Q2 2024, Riot booked $13.9 million in power credits. It signed a 10-year lease with AMD at its Rockdale site, a deal with a $311 million value and expansion options reaching $1 billion. This deal covers 200 megawatts of capacity. Riot controls 1.7 gigawatts of power across Texas after selling 1,080 BTC to fund expansion. You should watch the divergence between pure miners and power-backed operators, as the latter hold the advantage. During the 2021 winter storm, a site Riot acquired received $125 million for selling power back to the grid. The construction of AI data centers requires massive upfront capital, and delays can hit cash flow if AI demand cools.

Expansion speed and high-value leases

CleanSpark secured a 100-megawatt development site in Cheyenne, Wyoming, after beating Microsoft in a competitive bid. The company expects growth toward 50 EH/s through projects in Wyoming, Tennessee, and Georgia. It currently operates 1.03 gigawatts of capacity and has 1.7 gigawatts under development. CleanSpark also expanded its deployed hashrate beyond 30 EH/s after completing a Mississippi facility acquisition. Its Tennessee facilities have developed data center infrastructure backed by 234 MW. TeraWulf signed a 20-year lease with Anthropic for 401 megawatts in Kentucky, a deal worth $19 billion in contracted revenue that demonstrates the value of controlling large-scale, power-secured infrastructure in a market where capacity is increasingly scarce. TeraWulf sold its interest in the Abernathy joint venture for $530 million to recycle capital. However, TeraWulf reported a net income loss of $455 million for Q2 and a $25.7 million impairment on mining assets. High-performance compute leasing now accounts for 71% of TeraWulf’s total revenue. The Muskie Data Campus in Kentucky utilizes a partnership with Kentucky Power to provide one gigawatt of electric service. This project satisfies conditions for $600 million of Google’s credit support for fluid stacks obligations. Will the market continue to reward miners that transition to high-performance computing?