CoreWeave to acquire crypto miner Core Scientific for $9 billion in all-stock deal to fuel AI growth

CoreWeave is acquiring Core Scientific in an all-stock deal valued at $9 billion, the Nvidia-backed AI infrastructure company announced on Monday. The move will give CoreWeave access to massive energy resources built during the crypto boom—resources now in high demand as AI workloads soar.

The news of the acquisition came nearly a year after Core Scientific turned down the initial $1.02 billion offer, saying the offer undervalued the company and wasn’t in the best interest of shareholders.

CoreWeave’s $9 Billion Deal for Core Scientific Signals AI’s Power-Hungry Future

The deal highlights how AI companies are now targeting energy-rich assets once used for crypto mining. With demand for AI compute surging, firms like CoreWeave are shifting their attention away from traditional data centers and toward the kind of power-heavy sites that crypto miners built during the last bull run.

The agreement comes with a twist. Core Scientific filed for bankruptcy in late 2022 after bitcoin prices collapsed and energy costs spiked. It only emerged from Chapter 11 earlier this year. Now, it’s getting acquired by a former crypto miner that pivoted to AI.

The deal gives CoreWeave a way to bypass years of development and permitting headaches by taking over Core Scientific’s existing sites and long-term power contracts. According to CoreWeave, this acquisition will help wipe out more than $10 billion in future lease obligations over the next 12 years.

The offer values Core Scientific shares at $20.40 apiece—a nearly 66% premium compared to the stock’s close before deal rumors started circulating in June. But investors weren’t exactly cheering. Core Scientific shares dropped 15% in premarket trading, and CoreWeave slipped 4%.

“The offer represents a $20.40 per share value and implies a premium of nearly 66% to Core Scientific stock’s close before reports of potential deal talks first appeared in late June,” Reuters reported.

Founded in 2017 by former Myspace CTO and co-founder Aber Whitcomb, Core Scientific provides advanced blockchain and AI hosting, transaction processing, and application development services. The company’s platform supports large-scale partners globally, ensuring reliable solutions that adapt swiftly to market changes. According to its LinkedIn profile, Core Scientific employs over 100 people.

CoreWeave started out as an Ethereum mining outfit but pivoted away from crypto after Ethereum’s 2022 Merge upgrade made mining obsolete. Since then, the company has leaned hard into high-performance computing. According to its IPO filing, revenue jumped more than 8x last year.

Core Scientific had already been working with CoreWeave. Last year, the two signed a series of 12-year contracts, including one where Core Scientific agreed to provide 200 MW of infrastructure to support CoreWeave’s AI workloads.

Both companies say the deal is expected to close in Q4, with the final price still subject to change.

This acquisition makes one thing clear: the AI infrastructure arms race isn’t just about GPUs anymore. It’s about who controls the power to run them.