Core Scientific to end Bitcoin mining by end of 2026: 7.5% of revenue

Core Scientific expects to finish shutting down Bitcoin mining by the end of 2026. Chief financial officer Jim Nygaard gave the target on a Thursday Q3 earnings call. He said the company expects to complete the wind-down in the fourth quarter and start 2027 as a pure-play, high-density colocation provider. The company had already said in a July quarterly filing that hosted mining would stop by Dec. 31. That filing came as it kept winding down self-mining. The new comment sets a completion date for the full exit. The business it is moving toward is AI and high-performance computing infrastructure.

The latest quarterly results show how far the mix has moved. Third-quarter self-mining revenue fell to $12.3 million from $57.4 million a year earlier. Revenue from hosting other miners dropped to $5.2 million from $8.7 million. Bitcoin mining brought in just $17.5 million, or 7.5% of Core Scientific's $232.9 million in third-quarter revenue. Colocation services accounted for $215.4 million. Nygaard said the company had nearly 50% fewer miners online at the end of September than at the end of 2025.

The move into AI hosting began in 2024. Core Scientific signed an initial hosting agreement with CoreWeave in March that year. A much larger deal was announced in June. At the time, the company described AI hosting as an expansion alongside mining. Its June 2024 announcement stressed keeping Bitcoin mining capacity. By December 2025, The Wall Street Journal reported that Core Scientific was already aiming to wind down mining by 2028.

Mining economics added pressure in the following months. Core Scientific recorded $266.5 million in mining-related asset impairments in the first quarter of 2026. The company cited weaker Bitcoin prices, historically low hashprice and falling values for mining equipment on the secondary market. In the second quarter it ended its mining equipment agreement with Block and Proto. That step came with a $41.9 million loss as part of the transition.

The planned exit lands as US election results add uncertainty for companies expanding AI infrastructure. Reuters reported Wednesday that opponents of data-center development were among the winners of the Democrats' midterm gains. The backlash centers partly on electricity bills and the demands large facilities place on local resources. Cointelegraph said it reached out to Core Scientific for comment.