Bitcoin miners face widening AI financing costs as lenders scrutinize deals

The Bitcoin mining industry needs roughly $50 billion to complete planned AI infrastructure projects, with IREN, Riot Platforms and HIVE Digital facing major funding gaps. Bitcoin mining companies expanding into artificial intelligence and high-performance computing face sharply different borrowing costs as lenders scrutinize large-scale data center projects, adding to the industry’s growing financing challenges. “[B]ig lenders have become more selective about data center loans and decisions increasingly depend on the customer, the contract and the path to completion,” BlocksBridge said. IREN, which has expanded from Bitcoin mining into AI infrastructure, illustrates the differences in financing costs.