A new framework from asset manager VanEck is drawing a clear distinction between Bitcoin miners that are genuinely evolving into artificial intelligence infrastructure providers and those that are still just pitching a vision. And the cost of bridging that gap is enormous: roughly $50 billion in near-term funding stands between the sector’s ambitious plans and actual execution.
In a research note, VanEck investment analyst Griffin MacMaster and Head of Digital Assets Research Matthew Sigel presented what they call the first structured valuation method for the increasingly fuzzy category of companies operating at the intersection of Bitcoin mining and AI data center hosting.
Given that financial disclosures vary widely across the sector and cash flows remain in early stages, VanEck argues the most reliable metric available to investors today is gross energized power — that is, how many megawatts a company has actually brought online, not merely announced.
The difference between those two figures is already revealing. Companies that hold physical leases — including Cipher Mining (CIFR), Hut 8 (HUT), and TeraWulf (WULF) — are trading at valuations above 10x gross energized power.
In contrast, names like Marathon Digital (MARA) and CleanSpark (CLSK), which remain more tightly linked to Bitcoin mining with limited contracted AI capacity, are trading at just 2–6x that same measure.
“For now, we find that the market is paying for contracted and energized capacity, while discounting everything still in the pipeline,” the analysts wrote.
But signing contracts, VanEck cautions, is only the first step. Across the entire peer group, miners have delivered only about 25% of their leased capacity — a figure the firm expects to drop further before it improves, as large-scale construction projects begin ramping up in 2027 and 2028.
That execution gap is expected to become the primary driver of valuations going forward, with companies that fall behind on construction timelines facing what VanEck calls “structural de-ratings.”
The analysts also point out that very few of these companies have any track record building the kind of infrastructure AI customers demand — making project management expertise just as critical as raw megawatt counts.
VanEck’s deal tracker points to a busy second half of 2026, with multiple companies — including Bitdeer (BTDR), HIVE Digital (HIVE), Riot Platforms (RIOT), and Core Scientific (CORZ) — at various stages of active or advanced lease negotiations. WULF is described as being in “advanced negotiations” on a 480MW site in Kentucky, with a customer expected to be secured in the second quarter.
A $221 billion build — and who can afford it
The capital requirements of this transition are staggering. VanEck estimates the sector’s long-term capital expenditure needs at close to $221 billion, with near-term requirements alone creating a collective funding gap of roughly $50 billion beyond current cash reserves.
The variation within the group is significant. HIVE faces the most severe pressure relative to its market cap, driven by its AI Gigafactory ambitions targeting more than 100,000 GPUs. IREN and KEEL carry the next largest near-term burdens. By comparison, WULF and CIFR appear relatively better positioned, having already locked in contracted anchor deals that help reduce the risk around their capital raises.
Funding strategies differ considerably. Companies with Bitcoin treasury holdings — including MARA (35,303 BTC), CLSK (13,561 BTC), and HUT (13,696 BTC) — can tap Bitcoin monetization strategies to partially fund construction.
REN, which faces a large near-term funding need with no BTC treasury to rely on, has a narrower set of options: dilutive equity issuances or additional debt.
VanEck: Bitcoin exposure is overstated
The report also questions how tightly the market ties the entire group to Bitcoin prices. While the group’s average daily-return correlation to BTC runs around 0.55 year-to-date and average one-year beta sits at approximately 1.05, VanEck argues that dynamic overstates the sector’s true Bitcoin sensitivity for companies that have largely moved on.
Only MARA (with BTC-sensitive value equal to ~98% of market cap), CLSK (~53%), and RIOT (~23%) carry meaningful balance-sheet exposure to Bitcoin price swings. On the other end, CORZ, WULF, APLD, and IREN have effectively decoupled.
The analysis shows that a drop in Bitcoin to $50,000 would wipe out roughly 45% of MARA’s equity value and nearly 50% of HIVE’s, while trimming just 4% from HUT’s — highlighting how poorly the “single BTC trade” narrative captures the increasingly divergent nature of the group.
VanEck expects valuations to eventually shift away from megawatt counts toward delivery ratios, unit economics, and ultimately discounted cash flow models — at which point these companies will begin to look more like data center REITs than miners.
The firm anticipates that many could ultimately be acquired or converted into REITs as their AI revenue matures.
For now, VanEck sees the greatest re-rating potential in names with the widest gap between ambition and current market pricing — HIVE, KEEL, IREN, and Bitdeer — while acknowledging those same names carry the highest execution risk. Companies with anchor deals already secured, like WULF, CIFR, and HUT, offer a more conservative path to compounding that advantage into long-term market position.
