Bitcoin Miners Are Missing the Rally: Why Only Canaan Has Outperformed BTC

Bitcoin has risen roughly 22% since Aug. 17, 2026. Yet among the bitcoin-mining and mining-adjacent companies tracked by The Block, only Canaan has outperformed the cryptocurrency over that period. The other 10 names delivered a median return of 1.8%, while Core Scientific and TeraWulf lagged Bitcoin by 27% and 24%, respectively.

The divergence is not simply a judgment on whether mining benefits from a higher Bitcoin price. Public miners are increasingly being assessed as operators of AI and high-performance-computing infrastructure, businesses whose returns depend on capital deployment, construction and customer execution as much as on the economics of producing BTC. Canaan stands out because its recent operating recovery has retained a more direct mix of machine sales and self-mining exposure. That distinction has not made it consistently profitable.

The 22% Bitcoin rally that left 10 mining stocks behind

The usual case for miner equities is straightforward: rising Bitcoin can lift the value of coins held on balance sheets and improve the potential revenue generated by each unit of computing power. The recent market performance shows how incomplete that shorthand has become.

The Block reported that Canaan was the sole outperformer in its tracked group following Bitcoin's roughly 22% advance from Aug. 17. A 1.8% median return for the remaining companies is not a modest shortfall against the underlying asset; it is a sign that investors are placing meaningful weight on risks and businesses outside the Bitcoin price itself.

Core Scientific's 27% lag and TeraWulf's 24% lag make the point especially clearly. A rally in the commodity mined by these companies has not been sufficient to overcome the other factors embedded in their equity valuations.

AI and HPC diversification changed what investors are buying

The sector's strategic turn toward high-performance computing and AI data centers helps explain the weaker Bitcoin sensitivity. Those businesses can provide a source of diversification when crypto markets decline, potentially supporting miners' balance sheets when native mining economics are under pressure.

But diversification also changes the trade. Management teams must divide their attention, capital and operating infrastructure between mining and data-center projects. Investors consequently take on execution and infrastructure risks that do not disappear when Bitcoin rises, according to The Block's account of the sector's performance.

That means a miner pursuing HPC may no longer trade as a clean leveraged expression of BTC. Its share price can instead turn on whether it can deliver power, facilities and data-center capacity effectively. The strategic shift may be rational for companies seeking earnings less tied to the crypto cycle, but it weakens the expectation that a Bitcoin rally will automatically translate into broad equity outperformance.

The mining business itself remains constrained by the protocol's reward schedule. Bitcoin's April 19, 2024 halving cut the block reward to 3.125 BTC from 6.25 BTC. The next halving is estimated for April 2028, when the reward is expected to fall again to 1.5625 BTC, as described in an SEC filing. Prices, transaction fees or better efficiency would have to offset that structural reduction in revenue per block.

Canaan's machine sales and self-mining expansion restored direct Bitcoin exposure

Canaan's appeal in this comparison rests on concrete operating improvement across both sides of its mining business: selling equipment to customers and deploying computing power for itself. Its 2025 revenue rose 96.7% year over year to $529.7 million. Mining revenue increased 157.2% to $113.2 million.

The company sold 36.5 EH/s of computing power, a 40.7% increase, and reported $41.2 million in gross profit for the year after a gross loss of $84.3 million in 2024. Those figures point to a recovery in demand and gross-margin performance rather than an equity move supported solely by Bitcoin's appreciation.

Hardware demand was also evident in the fourth quarter. Product sales reached $164.9 million, aided by an order for more than 50,000 A15 Pro machines, according to Canaan's full-year and fourth-quarter 2025 release.

At the same time, Canaan has become more exposed to the coins it produces. Installed mining hashrate reached 9.91 EH/s, while its year-end cryptocurrency treasury held approximately 1,750 BTC and 3,951 ETH. The combination gives the company a route to benefit from equipment demand and a larger direct link to mining output and digital-asset holdings.

That does not make Canaan a pure Bitcoin proxy. Machine sales have their own order, inventory and margin cycles. Still, compared with a peer group increasingly being valued on HPC and AI data-center delivery, Canaan's expansion in self-mining helps explain why investors have treated its shares differently during this BTC advance.

Original visual accompanying The Block’s comparison of Bitcoin and publicly traded mining stocks. — Source: The Block

Efficiency is Canaan's hedge against the post-halving revenue squeeze

In a post-halving market, scale alone does not settle the question of mining economics. The reduced reward raises the importance of how much electricity and computing work are required to produce coins, particularly when the block subsidy is fixed at 3.125 BTC until the next scheduled reduction.

Canaan's May operating update showed improvement on those measures. Its North American fleet efficiency reached a record 17.9 J/TH, global efficiency was 23.7 J/TH, and average all-in power cost was $0.043 per kWh. It mined 90 BTC during the month, according to the company's June SEC-filed operating update.

The next expected reward cut in 2028 will sharpen the longer-term pressure created by the halving’s arithmetic, which efficiency cannot repeal. For Canaan, efficiency still improves the operating position of its self-mining fleet relative to less efficient capacity—a meaningful consideration as its equity case incorporates an expanding mining operation alongside its hardware-sales business.

Canaan's fourth-quarter losses show the limits of the equity rerating

The market outperformance should not be confused with a completed turnaround. Canaan's fourth-quarter results included a $13.9 million inventory and purchase-commitment write-down. Its mining segment recorded $37.0 million in costs against $30.4 million in mining revenue, leaving the unit unprofitable on that measure.

The company reported a $23.6 million operating loss and an $85.0 million net loss for the quarter. These figures sit alongside the annual revenue and gross-profit recovery, rather than being erased by it.

They also identify the key limit on the current comparison. Canaan has offered investors more direct exposure to hardware demand and self-mining at a time when many peers are being evaluated through an AI/HPC execution lens. But inventory risk, purchase commitments and mining unit economics remain capable of determining its financial results even as Bitcoin rises.

Disclaimer: This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.