CleanSpark signs $6.6B data center lease in pivot from Bitcoin mining

CleanSpark's $6.6 billion data center lease with a global technology company marks the largest pivot yet by a Bitcoin miner into AI infrastructure.

CleanSpark signed a 20-year triple-net lease with an unnamed high-investment-grade global technology company to convert its Sandersville, Georgia facility into a high-performance computing data center, the company said July 14. The base lease covers 175 megawatts of critical IT load across the 250-megawatt site and carries a total contract value of approximately $6.6 billion, with two five-year extension options that could lift the figure to $11.6 billion.

"This morning we announced the signing of a 20-year triple net lease agreement directly with a high investment grade global technology company that will transform our 250-megawatt facility in Sandersville, Georgia, into our first high-performance compute data center," Chief Executive Officer and Chairman Matt Schultz said on the company's investor update call.

CleanSpark expects the lease to generate roughly $330 million in average annual net operating income, with margins "close to 100 percent" under the triple-net structure, Chief Financial Officer and President Gary Vecchiarelli said. The company estimates cash capital expenditures for the build-out at $10 million to $12 million per critical IT megawatt, with the first data hall expected to be ready for service in the fourth quarter of 2027 and remaining halls ramping into early 2028.

The deal represents a strategic shift for CleanSpark, which has operated primarily as a Bitcoin miner with 50 exahashes per second of hashrate and 13,924 Bitcoin on its balance sheet valued at roughly $900 million. The company now has 1.8 gigawatts of contracted power and said it expects that figure to reach 2.1 gigawatts through the ERCOT review process. In connection with the Sandersville lease, CleanSpark entered an exclusivity window with the same counterparty for its Texas assets in Sealy and Brazoria, which represent up to 885 megawatts of secured and planned power capacity.

Vecchiarelli said the company expects to finance "the overwhelming majority" of the Sandersville build-out with project-based debt, noting that recent data center financing transactions have been as much as six times oversubscribed. CleanSpark held approximately $200 million in cash as of June 30, along with an undrawn $400 million Bitcoin-backed revolver. The company has not raised equity capital in more than 20 months and has repurchased more than $600 million of its own shares, Vecchiarelli said, calling equity the firm's "highest cost of capital currently."

Shares of CleanSpark rose 12 percent to $13.85 in Tuesday trading, though the stock remains down roughly 25 percent over the past month heading into the announcement. Short interest sits at 33 percent, according to market data. By contrast, peer miners Riot Platforms, MARA Holdings, Hut 8 and HIVE Digital Technologies were flat to slightly higher, confirming the move as a company-specific catalyst. Riot's comparable lease with Advanced Micro Devices at its Rockdale facility carries $636 million in total contract value over 10 years — an order of magnitude smaller than the CleanSpark headline.

The Sandersville lease shifts CleanSpark's revenue profile away from Bitcoin price-dependent mining margins toward contracted, long-duration income from a creditworthy tenant. The next test is execution: bringing 175 megawatts online by late 2027, converting the Texas letter of intent into signed leases, and financing the build-out without diluting shareholders. Citizens initiated coverage with an Outperform rating and a $27 price target, while Chardan lifted its target to $19 from $16, both citing the hyperscale compute pivot as a re-rating catalyst.

This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice.