Bitcoin miners are increasingly abandoning traditional mining for AI infrastructure, raising fresh questions about network security and BTC supply.
While the bearish market conditions are affecting the investors deeply, one section of the ecosystem has decided to remove itself from the suffering - Bitcoin Miners.
As the recovery remains delayed, these miners have opted to switch to facilitating AI services, resulting in Bitcoin’s Hashrate taking a major hit.
In the last 24 hours, Keel Infrastructure decommissioned all of its US Bitcoin mining operations as it repurposes the sites for AI and high-performance computing data centers. The company had a bleak Q2 as revenue fell 50% year over year to $30.4 million, while the company posted a $65 million net loss.
Keel also sold about a third of its BTC holdings. 1,085 BTC was sold for about $75 million between April 1 and August 7. The company now has 1,861 BTC remaining and $819 million in total liquidity reported.
Adding to this shift is Bitcoin miner Riot, which struck a $9.1 billion compute deal with Anthropic.
The deal was for Anthropic to secure 191 MW of computing capacity at Riot’s Rockdale campus in Texas.
The rising demand for AI services and tools has left the Claude maker struggling to find adequate resources. Anthropic’s deal with Riot could solve this problem. However, the full capacity is expected to come online by June 2028.
The AI company will also have an option to extend the deal. Two five-year expansions could push the total value of the contract to $16.1 billion.
Enterprise Bitcoin holders have moved to selling over the last couple of months, including the biggest BTC treasury company, Strategy. Strategy announced it sold 1,690 BTC for $108.6 million between August 3 and August 9 at an average price of $64,262, with all proceeds used to repurchase STRC shares.
The company also sold 6.59 million MSTR shares for $653.1 million, using $650 million to increase its U.S. dollar reserve to $4.65 billion. Strategy now holds 840,447 BTC acquired for $63.36 billion at an average price of $75,385.
With Bitcoin’s price sitting at $64,299, the entire BTC treasury is already sitting at a loss. If this isn’t corrected soon, Strategy will continue its selling.
Miners aren’t too behind either, with MARA, the world’s largest publicly traded Bitcoin miner, disclosing that it sold approximately 23,093 BTC for $1.63 billion. MARA sold these holdings during the first half of 2026, at an average price of about $70,631.
Usually, miners tend to sell into strength as it bears them profits on their investment. However, MARA’s sales in the current market conditions are a sign of desperation and rising losses. MARA even had to secure a $600 million in new loans from Coinbase and Two Prime.
The money will be dedicated towards the Long Ridge Energy & Power acquisition, which will be MARA's stepping into facilitating AI services as well.
Nevertheless, the Bitcoin miner still holds 35,577 BTC valued at about $2.08 billion, which will keep it from an immediate collapse.
This exodus of Bitcoin miners is hurting the Hashrate of the network, which is observing its biggest drop ever this cycle. Hashrate is a measure of the overall computational power being consumed to support the Bitcoin network.
This Hashrate is now at a 13-month low, marking a 32% decline from its all-time high around October 2025, right around the time BTC price also hit its peak.
The move towards AI can trigger a stronger bearish trend in the Bitcoin market if the security of the network is compromised by the declining Hashrate.
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