Several publicly traded Bitcoin miners are significantly scaling back their mining operations, reallocating power and infrastructure toward data centers that support artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing (HPC). This transition signals a broader industry shift away from purely generating cryptocurrency.
According to BlocksBridge Consulting’s latest analysis, realized hashrate among a group of public miners dropped by more than 13% over half a year—falling from 368.3 to 319 exahashes per second (EH/s). The contraction becomes even more pronounced, exceeding 21%, when excluding Bitdeer, a miner that increased its hashrate by 44% during the same period. In contrast, the overall Bitcoin network saw a 10.6% decline, indicating that many public miners are divesting from mining activities at a faster pace than the broader network.
This strategic pivot aligns with a growing trend of miners generating substantial revenue outside of cryptocurrency mining. Companies like Core Scientific and TeraWulf now derive the majority of their income from non-mining services. Core Scientific reported $136.7 million in colocation revenue, significantly surpassing its $27.5 million from mining, while TeraWulf earned $31.9 million from HPC leases compared to $12.8 million from Bitcoin mining.
Other miners such as Riot Platforms and Bitdeer remain primarily focused on mining revenue but are at earlier stages of this industry evolution. The industry’s shift reflects changing economic realities following a boom period triggered by China’s Bitcoin mining ban. That ban caused one of the sharpest drops in global mining power before a recovery driven by North American miners relocating and expanding their capacity.
Since then, weakening mining profitability combined with soaring demand for AI infrastructure has prompted many operators to repurpose energy and facilities that once powered Bitcoin mining. This marks a fundamental adjustment in how energy-intensive blockchain and related industries balance their business models, laying the groundwork for a growing overlap between crypto infrastructure and AI computing services.