I just noticed a radical shift in the market's perception of miners. At the start of 2024, they were considered stuck in an outdated business model, but now, in 2026, the situation is completely different.

The story is simple: artificial intelligence requires massive amounts of electricity, and electricity has become scarcer than gold. These miners who owned land connected to power grids since 2021 suddenly turned into strategic resource owners. A whole new valuation of the game.

The scene is clear: building a new substation takes 5-7 years. This means that only existing facilities already connected to the grid can respond immediately to AI model training demands. But entering the game now isn't cheap—building an AI-ready facility costs between $8 million and $11 million per megawatt.

The true leaders in this space are obvious: Iris Energy, valued at $14 billion with a capacity of 2,910 MW, and Riot Platforms with 1.7 gigawatts of approved power, along with Terawulf and Hut 8, which signed massive contracts worth $6.7 billion and $7 billion.

But a deeper transformation has occurred here. Giants like Google and Microsoft have started providing financial guarantees for lease agreements. This shifts risks from instability to commitments from tech giants. The result? These miners entered the bond market with interest rates around 7.125%, securing up to 85% of project costs from J.P. Morgan and Goldman Sachs.

On the technical side, NVIDIA Blackwell GB200 processors, consuming 120 kW per rack, changed everything. Direct liquid cooling has become essential. So, projects like Linggang 2.0 in Shanghai—underwater data centers with 1.15 energy efficiency and seawater cooling—are emerging, reducing energy consumption by 40-60%.

The most exciting part? CoreWeave is preparing for an IPO valued at $35 billion, thanks to massive hardware orders, including $22.4 billion from OpenAI. Those who missed out on Blackwell chips in 2024 are practically barred from the core market. There’s a backlog of 3.6 million units just for Blackwell.

The truth is, these miners are no longer just mining operators. They’ve become electrical grid engineers. Factories that were flexible in their energy consumption are now essential loads requiring stable supplies. This changes everything about how global power grids are planned.

The real question now: can the pure, undiversified mining model survive when profits per megawatt are this high? The answer will determine the entire industry’s future.