Miner Equities Rally on AI Infrastructure Bump
Bitcoin miner stocks have staged a broad recovery in 2026, despite weak mining economics. The rally is primarily driven by revenue generated from AI and high-performance computing infrastructure, rather than traditional mining activities. According to CryptoQuant data, RIOT gained 83%, followed by HUT at 72%, BITF at 50%, and CORZ at 31%.
The strong performance of miner equities in the second quarter has been accompanied by a decline in revenue from actual mining activities. This divergence suggests that investors are increasingly valuing miners for their power capacity, grid connections, and other infrastructure-related assets. However, this potential opportunity for revenue growth is not yet equally distributed among all participants within the industry.
Bitcoin's price has fallen 49% from October's peak, while the hashrate declined only 23%, keeping competition relatively high. This imbalance compresses revenue per unit of computing power, and fees provide little relief at just 0.71% of miner income. The Miner Position Index (MPI) remains negative, indicating that miners continue to be reluctant to send their mined Bitcoins to exchanges.
Despite the challenges facing mining economics, listed miners are increasingly redirecting existing power infrastructure toward AI and HPC capacity. Riot has contracted 241 MW at Rockdale, including 191 MW tied to a 20-year agreement worth roughly $9.1 billion. Hut 8 has commercialized 949 MW, carrying an expected base-term value of $26.6 billion.