Riot Platforms Scores $9 Billion AI Compute Deal, Marking Shift Away from Crypto Mining

Riot Platforms has signed a massive $9.1 billion compute lease agreement with Anthropic for its Rockdale, Texas campus, marking a significant shift in the company's focus away from pure crypto mining.

The deal is for 20 years and could rise to $16.1 billion if two five-year extensions are exercised, making it one of the largest deals in the industry.

Riot's Rockdale campus now has two tenants, including Advanced Micro Devices, with a total of $9.8 billion in contracted data center revenue.

Publicly traded bitcoin miners are increasingly being valued as owners of digital infrastructure rather than just producers of bitcoin, driven by weak cryptocurrency prices and strong AI demand.

Crossing over into the AI sector could be a strategic move for Riot, but it also raises questions about valuation and profitability in the mining industry.