Bitcoin Miners Face Roughly $50B Funding Gap In The Race To Build AI Infrastructure, VanEck Says

VanEck expects many AI-focused miners to become data-center or acquisition targets, making funding and execution crucial.

• Bitcoin miners aiming for the AI data-center market face a $50 billion funding gap, says VanEck.
• The 71-year-old investment platform said that investors should value miners based on gross energy output rather than Bitcoin production.
• Companies such as Cipher Mining, Hut 8, and TeraWulf Inc. have signed significant AI leases, trading at over 10 times their gross energized power.

Bitcoin (BTC) miners chasing the artificial intelligence (AI) data-center boom may need tens of billions in fresh capital before they can deliver on their ambitions.

According to VanEck's latest report published on Tuesday, publicly traded miners pursuing artificial intelligence and high-performance computing (HPC) opportunities face an estimated $50 billion near-term funding gap, with long-term capital requirements reaching roughly $221 billion. 

The asset manager argued that investors should increasingly value miners based on gross energized power rather than Bitcoin production, reflecting the sector's rapid shift toward AI infrastructure. The report comes after some of the largest miners have announced multibillion-dollar hyperscaler leases.

Execution Is The Next Catalyst

VanEck found that companies with signed AI leases, including Cipher Mining Inc. (CIFR), Hut 8 Corp. (HUT), and TeraWulf Inc. (WULF), trade at more than 10 times gross energized power. By contrast, Marathon Digital Holdings Inc. (MARA) and CleanSpark Inc. (CLSK), which are still marketing future capacity, trade at roughly 2 to 6 times that gross energized power.

Cipher anchored its premium with a nearly $5.5 billion, 15-year lease with Amazon Web Services (AWS) to deliver 300 megawatt (MW) of AI capacity beginning July this year, while Hut 8 has stacked a $9.8 billion, 352 MW Texas deal on top of a $7 billion Louisiana lease with Google-backed Fluidstack. TeraWulf locked in $3.7 billion in Fluidstack contracts at its Lake Mariner campus, with Google (GOOG) providing a $1.8 billion backstop in exchange for an 8% equity stake.

VanEck estimates the group has only delivered approximately 25% of leased capacity to date, which means construction milestones and project execution, not deal announcements, will be the next phase of valuations. The report said companies missing delivery targets are punished with sharp re-ratings, according to the report. 

That risk is most visible at Marathon, where analysts have flagged caution around the AI pivot even as the miner closed a $1.5 billion Long Ridge acquisition to add over 1 GW of potential capacity.

VanEck Says BTC To AI Miners Are Trading At Fair Value  

VanEck also pointed out HIVE Digital Technologies Ltd. (HIVE) as one of the most aggressive funding stories in the sector, with capital needs far beyond its current market value as it looks to build AI Gigafactories.

The report also highlighted potential valuation upside for HIVE, Bit Digital Inc. (BTBT), Wytec International Inc. (WYTC), and IREN Ltd. (IREN), while Marathon Digital, CleanSpark, TeraWulf, and Core Scientific Inc. (CORZ) appears closer to fair value.

IREN's case is built on a $9.7 billion multi-year Microsoft GPU cloud contract and a separate $2.1 billion Nvidia investment tied to delivering up to 5 GW of AI infrastructure. Core Scientific, meanwhile, sits in a different bucket after shareholders voted down its all-stock merger with CoreWeave (CRWV), leaving the company to pursue its existing 200 MW hosting contract independently.

Not Every Miner Is A Bitcoin Bet

VanEck noted that as miners sign longer-term AI contracts, tenant quality becomes a critical differentiator. Investment-grade hyperscaler customers can reduce financing costs to roughly 6% to 10%, compared with mid-to-high-teen rates typically associated with traditional Bitcoin mining operations.

That gap is what's pushing miners toward credit markets in size. Hut 8 alone is seeking up to $3.25 billion in senior secured notes for its Louisiana buildout, while Cipher is raising $810 million through a subsidiary to finance its AWS-anchored Stingray facility.

The nearly $200-billion dollar asset manager, VanEck, expects many AI-focused miners to eventually resemble data-center real estate investment trusts, or become acquisition targets, making financing and execution increasingly important to investors.

VanEck Digital Assets Mining ETF (DAM) was down over 2% in pre-market. On Stocktwits retail sentiment around DAM remained in the ‘neutral’ zone, while chatter stayed at ‘normal’ levels over the past day.

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