CIFR

CIFR extends Barber Lake lease to 20 years, lifting contracted revenues above $9B while revising delivery phases and cost-sharing terms.

Cipher Digital (NASDAQ: CIFR), the data center developer, has struck agreements that double the lease term of its Barber Lake data center in Colorado City, Texas, to 20 years. The company said Friday it signed a binding commitment with an unnamed leading artificial intelligence lab to lease the facility for an additional 10 years after its existing lease with Fluidstack concludes.

The AI infrastructure trade is moving higher as investors focus on long-term power access and contracted revenue, with Cipher Digital leading a group that includes TeraWulf and Applied Digital.

Additional 10-Year Term adds ~$5.2 Billion of Contracted Revenue at Barber Lake Additional 10-Year Term adds ~$5.2 Billion of Contracted Revenue at Barber Lake

Cipher Digital is rated a Speculative Buy, targeting $30–32 in 12 months, reflecting its AI pivot and major hosting contracts. CIFR's $11.4B total contracted revenue pipeline — anchored by a Google-backed Fluidstack lease — and rapid data center expansion underpin the bullish thesis despite recent revenue and earnings misses. Balance sheet risk is significant: $6B in debt, $800M convertible bonds, and potential dilution from Google's 24M warrants.

UBS has initiated coverage on five AI data center colocation stocks with Buy ratings, citing constrained compute supply and favorable power access positioning the group for rapid growth as AI adoption accelerates.  The bank started coverage of Hut 8 Mining Corp (TSX:HUT, Unlisted (US):HUTMF), TeraWulf (NASDAQ:WULF), Applied Digital (NASDAQ:APLD), Core Scientific (NASDAQ:CORZ) and Cipher Digital (NASDAQ:CIFR), pointing to their cryptomining legacies and grid access as key advantages.

Cipher Digital (NASDAQ:CIFR) shares jumped 13% Wednesday after the company secured conditional grid classifications for 3.2 gigawatts of Texas data-center capacity, though the designations stop short of authorizing power connections. The company first disclosed the 3.2-gigawatt total last week, then identified the individual sites in a breakdown posted on X on Tuesday.

Shares of Applied Digital (NASDAQ:APLD) and TeraWulf (NASDAQ:WULF) are rebounding Thursday morning as the oversold AI capacity trade catches a bid, with the sector fund and the broad tape also higher. Applied Digital stock is up 5% to $25.

Shares of Cipher Mining (NASDAQ:CIFR) are up 9% to $16.42 in early Wednesday trading after the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) disclosed conditional grid capacity covering 3.2 gigawatts across Cipher's Texas projects.

For years, bitcoin miners traded like a leveraged bet on the token they produce. That relationship broke down over the past year, according to a recent CoinShares report.