Core Scientific seeks $3.3 billion bond sale to further AI data center pivot

Core Scientific (CORZ) is preparing to raise $3.3 billion through a junk bond sale as it continues its transition toward artificial intelligence-focused data center operations.

Demand for AI services has pushed data centers, power supply and advanced chips to their limits. To keep up, firms are tapping riskier parts of the debt market for funds to keep developing their operations. Core Scientific, once a bitcoin miner, sold $175 million in bitcoin last month to further its AI pivot.

Borrowers linked to AI infrastructure have raised $17.9 billion in junk bonds so far this year, Bloomberg reported. CORZ itself is building six data centers that will support AI workloads, with the capacity leased to CoreWeave under a 12-year agreement that could bring in around $10 billion in revenue, the report adds, citing sources familiar with the deal.

Core Scientific’s move follows a string of large deals. Recent offerings tied to Google-backed data centers and CoreWeave raised a combined $6.7 billion. Another firm, Edged Compute, is marketing $1.3 billion in bonds to fund facilities leased to CoreWeave and an Alibaba unit.

Core Scientific said it will use proceeds to repay existing debt and fund reserves. It also plans to support construction across several states if costs exceed available funds, signaling how capital-intensive the AI buildout has become.

The company still holds “under 1,000 bitcoin,” according to CFO Jim Nygaard.

Big AI pivot

Core Scientific was founded in 2017 and grew into one of North America’s largest bitcoin miners before filing for Chapter 11 in December 2022, squeezed by high power costs and a weak bitcoin price. It emerged from reorganization in January 2024 and was relisted on Nasdaq under the ticker CORZ.

The pivot from bitcoin mining to AI hosting is all about the margins.

The April 2024 halving cut block rewards from 6.25 BTC to 3.125, and by late 2025, the average cash cost to mine one bitcoin rose while the price of BTC itself had been on a downturn, from over $125,000 to around $75,800. With rising power costs and competition, most miners became unprofitable and had to find alternative ways to continue earning revenue.

That’s when AI came to the rescue. Miners’ most valuable assets, already-built data centers and power contracts, meanwhile, gained a new use case: hosting computers that power AI.

Their power contracts, grid connections and cooling-ready sites are attracting hyperscalers, including Microsoft, Google parent Alphabet and others, in the ongoing AI race. Core Scientific was one of the first miners to pivot on a large scale, which caught investors’ attention and sparked the AI push.

Core Scientific’s shares were up about 6% on Tuesday and are up nearly 42% this year, while bitcoin fell 11%.