$1.3 Billion Debt: Bit Deer Faces Tough Battle

On February 20, 2026, BitDeer posted its weekly mining output update on Twitter: Mined 189.8 BTC during the week and sold it. Remaining inventory of 943.1 BTC sold in a single transaction.

Bitcoin Balance: 0.

In fact, Bitcoin mining has always been a form of time arbitrage from day one.

Using today's electricity and machines to acquire tomorrow's Bitcoin. No processing of the garage, no need for customers, and no need for branding. The input is the current cost, and the bet is on future prices. If your judgment is correct, time helps you make money.

This logic has been running for over a decade. What Wu Jihan is currently doing is redirecting this logic towards a new target.

The target has shifted from coin price to the long-term price of AI-driven computational power in the climate crisis. The means have transitioned from using electricity to mine coins to borrowing to buy land. The target of arbitrage has changed, but the structure of arbitrage remains.

During the same week as the Bitcoin liquidation, BitDeer also completed the pricing of a new $325 million bond.

According to BitDeer's financial report, as of December 31, 2025, BitDeer had $1 billion in book loans. So, the total debt amounts to approximately $1.3 billion.

Debts are real, land purchases are real, but the outcome of this tough battle may not be revealed until 2029.

1. A Mining Company That Doesn't Want to Be An AI Company Isn't a Good Company

Established in 2018, BitDeer started as a mining machine sharing platform. It is now one of the world's largest publicly listed mining companies, with a self-mining hash rate of 63.2 EH/s, making it the top self-mining entity among publicly listed companies globally, accounting for approximately 6% of the entire Bitcoin network hash rate.

However, Wu Jihan now doesn't want to sell hash rate; he wants to focus on power.

Breaking down BitDeer's financial reports, as of early 2026, BitDeer's global power pipeline had a total capacity of 3002 MW, with 1658 MW already operational and 1344 MW under construction or in planning. A single hyperscale data center for Microsoft or Google typically ranges from 100 to 300 MW.

This means that 3002 MW equals consolidating the power needs of 10 to 30 Google-sized hyperscale data centers into one company. Therefore, BitDeer's pipeline looks very impressive on paper.

The primary purpose of the $1.3 billion debt is to secure global power and land assets to pave the way for the transformation into AI data centers.

The first one, Rockdale, Texas, 563 MW (including 179 MW expansion), operational, mining-focused. This is our core business, with stable cash flow.

Next, Clarington, Ohio, 570 MW, 30-year lease, power contracts signed, originally planned to be completed in Q2 2027, positioned as an HPC/AI core site. This is the heart of the entire AI transformation plan. Also, it is currently the largest project, which we will detail later.

Then, Tydal, Norway, 175 MW, currently transforming the mining site into an AI data center, expected to be completed by the end of 2026, capable of supporting 164 MW of effective IT load. With hydroelectric resources, competitive energy costs. The transformation costs are much lower than new construction. It is currently the fastest progressing and lowest-risk card we have.

Land, power, and data center—the three things that the AI industry calls the "hardest-to-replicate assets." BitDeer has accumulated these over ten years of mining operation.

One thing that is rarely mentioned deserves a special mention: SEALMINER. BitDeer is not only building data centers but also developing in-house mining machine chips. The SEAL series has iterated to the third generation, with SEAL03 achieving an efficiency of 9.7 joules per terahash. The A3 Pro, mass-produced in September 2025, has entered the top echelon globally. SEAL04 is targeting 5 joules per terahash, and if achieved, it will surpass all mining machines currently on the market. The gross margin of self-developed chips exceeds 40%, far higher than mining itself.

This echoes what he did at Bitmain back in the day: from buying other people's shovels to making his own.

II. How Much Borrowing and How Much AI Revenue

To pursue AI, by the end of 2025, BitDeer's outstanding loans exceeded 1 billion USD. Adding a new loan of 325 million USD in February 2026, the total debt exceeded 1.3 billion USD.

In less than two years, multiple rounds of financing. In May 2024, Tether invested 100 million USD, becoming the second-largest shareholder, with attached warrants that can add another 50 million. Three months later, the first convertible bond of 150 million landed, with an 8.5% annual interest rate. In November of the same year, the second bond of 360 million, pushing the interest rate down to 5.25%.

In November 2025, a package deal arrived: 400 million in convertible bonds plus 148.4 million in equity issuance, in two matching sets. In February 2026, another 325 million in convertible bonds plus 43.5 million in equity, simultaneously using 135 million to buy back the earliest batch of old bonds due in 2029, extending the repayment deadline to 2032.

Totaling over $1.4 billion. The money flows to mining machines, data centers, AI infrastructure, along with rolling over debt.

However, with each bond issuance, BitDeer's stock price drops by 10% to 17%. This has become a fixed market reflex. Fortunately, the company still manages to receive the money each time.

The heart of the loan structure is convertible bonds. This batch of new bonds due in 2032, with an initial conversion price of around $9.93, carries a 25% premium over the concurrent equity issuance price of $7.94. If the stock price rises to that level, bondholders convert to stock, not cash. The company doesn't actually have to repay the money, only needing the stock price to rise.

The logic of convertible bonds is based on the belief that their stock price will increase. This, in itself, is a bet on whether the AI narrative can be market-validated. The annual interest burden, calculated based on a 5% average interest rate and a $1.3 billion principal, results in annual interest expenses exceeding $65 million. Yet, the full-year 2025 AI/HPC Cloud revenue is insufficient to cover even half a year's interest.

Currently, this interest payment relies entirely on continued bond issuance to roll over. It is impossible to say that the pressure is not significant.

With such a large investment, there must be an expectation of more tangible returns. So, let's see, how much revenue can AI bring to BitDeer?

The AI business currently generates $10 million in one year, accounting for less than 2% of total revenue. For a company with a market value of nearly $2 billion, this number is almost negligible.

Of course, this is not the end.

In three months, BitDeer's GPUs increased from 584 to 1,792, tripling in number. The utilization rate dropped from 87% to 41%, mainly because the machines are getting ready too quickly, with B200/GB200 still in the customer testing phase and revenue generation yet to begin. Electricity is set up, machines are being installed, the denominator is soaring, but the revenue hasn't caught up.

How high is the ceiling?

Roth/MKM estimates that with full deployment of HPC capacity, the annualized revenue potential is $850 million. The management is more aggressive: putting all 200 MW into AI cloud, the annualized revenue exceeds $2 billion, three times the full-year mining revenue in 2025.

However, both of these figures are based on three premises: timely completion of construction, securing long-term contracts with hyperscalers, and running GPUs at full capacity.

Currently, none of these three conditions have been met.

This is the battle that BitDeer is fighting: mining to support AI, AI creating hype, whether the hype can materialize will depend on the execution in the next two to three years.

III. The Tough Battle Lies in How Narrow the Time Window Is

A $1.3 billion debt sounds risky. However, BitDeer's debt structure is designed to look more stable than it seems on the surface.

Highly leveraged companies usually die for the same reason: debt concentration due, insufficient cash, forced to sell assets.

BitDeer has set the maturity dates of three convertible bonds in 2029, 2031, and 2032, respectively.

To some extent, it can be seen as a deliberately extended buffer zone. By the time the first batch matures, Tydal and Clarington should theoretically have landed; by the time the second batch matures, AI revenue should have started speaking; by the time the third batch matures, what this company really is will be judged by the market at that time. Three milestones, three opportunities for renegotiation.

But despite granting time through the convertible bonds, Wall Street is not buying it. Keefe Bruyette has cut the target price from $26.5 to $14. The current stock price is around $8. The market's signal is very clear: for a transformation story, revenue must be seen.

But all this pressure has given Wu Jihan what he needs most and what is most brutal: time.

The smoothest path may run like this: by the end of 2026, Tydal's transformation will be completed, Norway's 164 MW hydroelectric data center will be online, European customer contracts will start to generate revenue. In 2027, Clarington wins the lawsuit, and the 570 MW plant in Ohio officially starts construction, followed by major U.S. clients. From 2028 to 2029, the two core assets operate at full capacity, revenue approaches the $1 billion level, analysts reposition BitDeer from a discounted mining company to an AI infrastructure premium-labeled one. In 2029, the first batch of debt matures, bondholders, looking at the stock price, will most likely choose to convert rather than take cash.

In each of these tough battles, Wu Jihan must hit the timing spot on.

Next is Clarington.

In the same industrial park in Ohio, there's a steel manufacturer called American Heavy Plate Solutions, which signed a 30-year lease for 9.9 acres of land back in 2018. They sued BitDeer: stating that building the AI data center would disrupt shared electricity, roads, railways, and communication lines, violating the restrictive clauses. Their demand is for the court to issue a permanent injunction to prevent BitDeer from starting construction.

Clarington represents 42% of the pipeline under construction. If stalled, the entire timeline would need to be rewritten.

So Bitdeer's current biggest single point of risk is not debt, not stock price, but a steel plant.

The mining side is not taking a breather either. In February 2026, Bitcoin's network-wide difficulty surged by 14.7%, the largest single jump since May 2021. With the same electricity cost, fewer coins are being mined. The Q4 gross margin has dropped from 7.4% a year ago to 4.7%. The mining leg is slowly getting thinner.

The worst path is also clear: a two-year delay in the Clarington lawsuit, construction being halted; Tydal delayed, GPU utilization hovering around 41%; the first batch of debt due in 2029, not enough cash on hand, forced to refinance, stock price continues to dilute, and the conversion threshold becomes increasingly hard to reach.

Both paths are indeed real.

IV. Sell All the Bitcoins, and Then What

There is a tradition in the mining circle: HODLing coins is faith, an endorsement of Bitcoin's long-term value.

MARA has hoarded 53,250 BTC, Riot has hoarded 18,000, Strategy has hoarded 710,000. The more you hoard, the more the market believes in you.

Bitdeer is now at zero.

The official explanation is: selling coins is to provide liquidity for land purchases. This statement is not wrong. Peers are also moving in the same direction, with Riot selling $200 million worth of Bitcoin for AI expansion, Bitfarms is abandoning the "Bitcoin company" positioning, and MARA is also focusing on HPC.

But there is something more fundamental than identity iteration here.

Since day one, the mining industry has been betting on the same thing: something in the future will be more expensive than today's cost. Mining a decade ago was betting that the coin price would rise. Buying land now is betting that the demand for computing power will explode.

The target has changed, but the logic of temporal arbitrage has never changed.

What Wu Jihan truly acquired is the position of "whoever wins, has to pay me the electricity bill."

Not betting on the race, just blocking the entrance to the race. Amazon did not bet on which internet company would win, it just rented out servers to everyone. AT&T doesn't care what you talk about on the phone, it only cares if you made the call or not.

From selling products, to selling services, to collecting rent, the direction of industrial evolution has only ever been this one road.

The only difference is whether you walk over voluntarily or are pushed over.

Wu Jihan bought this opportunity for over a billion dollars. He is racing the speed of AI for the money to catch up with the debt.