What happened: Riot Platforms (RIOT) stock surged 17% in pre-market trading on Tuesday.
What’s behind the move: The bitcoin mining company, which has pivoted toward selling data center capacity, signed a deal with a major AI developer, widely reported to be Anthropic, in a transaction valued at $9.1 billion. “Today’s announcement of a landmark 20-year, 191-megawatt data center lease with a leading frontier AI lab marks a defining moment in our evolution into a leading developer of large-scale data centers,” said Jason Les, CEO of Riot, in the company’s earnings release
Riot also reported second-quarter revenue of $174 million, up 14% year over year, driven by growth in its data center and engineering businesses. What else you need to know: Riot Platforms and other bitcoin miners have increasingly leaned into leasing data center capacity as the crypto industry navigates a “winter,” and demand for computing power has skyrocketed. In January of this year, Riot announced its first major deal with AMD (AMD) at its Rockdale, Texas campus.
Year-to-date Riot stock is up 37%. Ines Ferre is a senior business reporter for Yahoo Finance. Follow her on X at @ines_ferre