The note says Core Scientific’s headline return is boosted by CoreWeave funding $750 million of $855 million in capex, while TeraWulf at 5% and Cipher at 4% may better reflect the sector.
Bernstein said headline figures for bitcoin miners moving into AI colocation are not comparable across the sector and can overstate expected returns. The firm said Core Scientific screens at a 75% return on assets, largely because CoreWeave is funding $750 million of the project’s $855 million capital expenditure, while TeraWulf at 5% and Cipher at 4% may be more representative of typical economics for miners pursuing AI colocation (leasing data center capacity for AI computing). The comparison underscores that financing structure, not just operating performance, can materially shape reported returns as bitcoin miners look to diversify beyond mining into high-performance computing and AI infrastructure.