The analysis published by Blocks Bridge Consulting on 20 August showed that 9 listed bitcoin mining companies that disclosed AI or high performance calculated business income had combined capital expenditure of $5.11 billion in the first half of 2026, compared to $341.2 million directly disclosed for the same period. This suggests that the shift of mining companies to data centre operations is still at an early stage of re-entry.

Income continues to grow in the second quarter

The combined AI and high performance calculated income of these companies amounted to $205.8 million in the second quarter of the year, an increase of 52 per cent over the previous quarter. On this basis, the related income for the first quarter is estimated at $135.4 million. Core Science, TeraWulf and Bitdeer all reported increases in data centre hosting or AI computing service income.

However, this set is not equivalent to AI return on investment. Blocks Bridge ' s capital expenditures cover productive assets such as hardware, land and equipment, some of which may still continue to serve the Bitcoin mining operations.

Mine rehabilitation still requires additional construction

The report notes that while mining companies usually own land, electricity resources and grid access, these assets do not directly meet the needs of AI clients. The conversion of existing mines to deliverable AI capacity will still require the input of power transformers, machine room construction, cooling systems and network equipment, and, in part, the configuration of GPUs.

This also means that mining companies often have to finance and build before tenants start paying. Construction progress, power access and customer concentration will affect when the project will become a stable cash flow.

Core Scientific and TerraWulf are moving faster.

In the second quarter, for example, the company earned $136.7 million from the safes, up from $77.5 million in the previous quarter; capital expenditure for the same period amounted to $797.5 million. According to the company, as of mid-July, 437 MW capacity had started billing clients.

Core Scientific also disclosed an agreement with AMD that could cover five sites in the future, approximately 530 MW. According to the company, the corresponding base income potential for these contracts exceeded $14 billion over 15 years. TeraWulf also previously disclosed that, for the first quarter of 2026, the revenue from high performance calculations had exceeded, for the first time, the revenue from mining in bitcoin.

New income is still smaller than invested

Blocksbridge argues that, given the different stages at which companies are located, this set is more appropriate to observe the intensity of investment in the industry than to directly measure profitability. The HIVE adopted a relatively small expansion route, with high-performance calculated income growth of 94 per cent to 1950 million dollars for the 2026 fiscal year, but mining remains the main source of income.

Overall, Bitcoin mining companies are extending power and site advantages to AI data centre operations, but the scale of new revenues is still significantly smaller than the level of capital invested. Next, the market is more concerned about the ability of these companies to deliver new capacity on schedule and to translate contracted electricity into sustained revenue.