Source: Bloomberg (paywall)
Mining operations like Core Scientific and Hut 8 are retrofitting their energy-intensive facilities to power AI compute rather than cryptocurrency validation. Bitcoin's depressed profitability and higher per-megawatt returns from training large language models are driving the shift. The move undermines political momentum around onshoring crypto infrastructure and exposes a basic truth: computational capacity flows toward whatever generates the best returns, not toward ideological commitment to any particular use case. AI infrastructure buildout may cannibalize rather than complement the Trump administration's crypto ambitions.