Bitcoin Miners Are Becoming Key Players in the AI Infrastructure Boom, Bernstein Says

• The Bitcoin mining sector accumulates more than 27 gigawatts of planned power capacity in the United States.
• Mining companies have announced contracts related to artificial intelligence worth over $90 billion.
• Securing a single gigawatt of grid-connected power can require more than four years in most U.S. states.

The recent alliance between Google and Blackstone to establish a new AI-oriented cloud venture could provide an indirect boost to Bitcoin miners, who control the critical power infrastructure required to sustain such technology. The announcement of this joint venture became known on Monday evening, detailing that Blackstone will commit $5 billion in initial equity to retain a majority stake, while Google will provide its custom chip technology. This initiative seeks to expand access to advanced computing infrastructure.

Following this corporate move, investment bank Bernstein published a report on Tuesday, May 19, 2026. Analysts at the firm indicated that companies dedicated to digital asset mining present themselves as strategic infrastructure providers due to their immediate access to the public electrical grid. The report explains that these mining firms possess a projected combined capacity exceeding 27 gigawatts within U.S. territory, an attractive figure for Silicon Valley tech corporations racing to build next-generation data centers.

The Energy Bottleneck and Multibillion-Dollar Deals

The deployment speed of new AI data centers faces severe restrictions regarding electricity access. According to compiled data, securing one gigawatt of guaranteed grid-connected power demands a timeframe of over four years across multiple regions in the United States. This administrative and technical delay motivates major tech firms and emerging cloud operators alike to seek commercial agreements outside of conventional data center developers.

Operators dedicated to digital mining responded by reconfiguring their facilities to transform into tech service providers. The mining industry registered contractual commitments linked to AI totaling over $90 billion, covering approximately 3.7 gigawatts of power capacity. Documentation analyzed by Bernstein reveals that one-third of these contracts were signed directly with major global tech corporations, while the remaining two-thirds correspond to so-called “neoclouds” or independent computing providers.

An example of this trend is seen in the firm IREN, which finalized a deal with Nvidia valued at $3.4 billion, including a $2.1 billion equity investment from the chipmaker for the deployment of graphics processing units (GPUs). On the other hand, Riot Platforms ratified an AI colocation contract with semiconductor company AMD. Sector companies such as Core Scientific and HUT 8 also maintain active agreements with corporate clients in the cloud computing segment.

The financial institution Bernstein maintains an outperform rating for four mining firms evaluated in its report: IREN, with a target price set at $100; Riot Platforms, with a target of $25; CleanSpark, with a target of $24; and Core Scientific, placed at an estimated price of $24.

In contrast, it assigned a market-perform rating to MARA Holdings with a target of $23. The development and execution of the initial supply phase of the Google and Blackstone joint project, scheduled for 2027 with the goal of activating the first 500 megawatts of data center capacity, will serve as a verifiable indicator of the adoption pace of these repurposed infrastructures.

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