The most expensive resource in the AI era is not GPUs, but electricity.

Bernstein reported this morning: North American BTC mining companies have already locked in 27 GW of power capacity and signed AI computing power orders with a value of $90B . IREN, Riot, and CleanSpark, three leading players, have pushed their “mining” businesses onto the second curve.
The narrative has completely flipped—AI giants are forced to line up to request mining companies.
It takes 3-5 years for data centers to apply to and connect to the power grid; the power contracts held by mining companies are already in place; OpenAI, Google, and Meta can’t wait out this cycle for computing power—whoever has ready-to-use electricity becomes the new upstream.
Bargaining power has reversed: last year, mining companies sought NVDA chips; this year, Sundar emails Riot’s CEO asking for electricity.
You also need to see the secondary impact: second-tier mining companies such as MARA, HUT8, and CIFR—previously mistakenly “sold off” because of BTC declines—now have their valuation anchors needing to be redrawn; based on AI data center REITs, not on mining companies.