Shares of Bitcoin mining companies with growing AI data-center exposure staged a powerful rally on July 30, 2026, posting gains of 20% to 31% after two catalysts hit the market. The first was the forced liquidation of Leopold Aschenbrenner’s Situational Awareness fund, which had held over $1 billion across six AI-focused mining names. The second was news that Google is backing a $15 billion financing package for an Anthropic-linked data-center campus in Texas.
IREN (IREN) led the charge, climbing roughly 30.7% to $38.26. Other major movers included Hut 8 (HUT) up 22.7%, CleanSpark (CLSK) up 21.1%, Core Scientific (CORZ) up 20.4%, and TeraWulf (WULF) gaining 18.1%. Bitdeer, Riot Platforms, and HIVE Digital also rose sharply. The upswing marked a sharp turnaround after weeks of heavy selling across AI-infrastructure and crypto-linked equities.
The Aschenbrenner fund’s liquidation was reportedly driven by margin calls. Its March 31 13F filing showed it owned sizeable stakes in all six companies, with the largest holdings in IREN (nearly 11.7 million shares valued at over $400 million) and Core Scientific (26 million shares valued at about $390 million). Ken Griffin’s Citadel purchased the bulk of the fund’s stock portfolio, according to The Wall Street Journal, removing a major overhang that had weighed on the sector.
Simultaneously, Google emerged as a backer of Nexus Data Centers’ planned Hubbard, Texas campus, which would host AI developer Anthropic. A group of banks led by Morgan Stanley is discussing a $15 billion package that includes a $14 billion bridge loan and a revolving credit facility. Google would guarantee billions in Anthropic’s lease and power-payment obligations in exchange for an estimated 20% equity stake. The campus features an on-site natural-gas plant capable of generating 1.6 gigawatts, bypassing grid-connection delays.
The Google-Anthropic deal follows a series of blockbuster AI leases signed by mining firms in July. TeraWulf inked a 20-year, ~$19 billion contract with Anthropic for 401 MW in Kentucky. CleanSpark followed with a $6.6 billion, 175-MW lease in Georgia, expandable to $11.6 billion. Hut 8 locked a second 352-MW expansion in Texas that brought its Beacon Point campus’s total base-term value to $19.6 billion. IREN announced $2.8 billion in multi-year cloud contracts and raised its year-end AI revenue target above $4 billion. Core Scientific gave AMD access to up to 2.5 GW of capacity in a deal whose value was not disclosed.
These agreements underscore how power and data-center assets originally secured for Bitcoin mining are being repurposed to meet surging AI demand. The twin catalysts of a fund liquidation clearing the decks and a mega-project backed by Google lit a fire under the sector, sending shares dramatically higher and reinforcing the industry’s pivot from pure-play crypto mining to high-performance computing.
