Crypto Stocks Plunge Wednesday, With Galaxy, Bitcoin Miners Leading Decline

Crypto-related stocks have been pummeled on Wednesday with recently high-flying bitcoin miners with artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure taking the biggest hit.

Bitfarms (BITF), Cipher Mining (CIFR), Hut 8 (HUT) and HIVE$0.1028 tumbled 10%-15% in the early hours of the session. Galaxy (GLXY), the digital asset investment firm with a growing data center operation, was beaten down 15% more than erasing all of its gains after Tuesday's earnings report.

The CoinShares Bitcoin Mining ETF (WGMI), a proxy for the sector, was 7% lower.

Crypto stocks outside of mining weren't spared either. Bakkt Holdings (BKKT), which surged over 300% earlier this month, sank another 7.5% and is now down almost 40% in a week. Strategy (MSTR), the world's largest corporate bitcoin holder, slipped 4% to below $290.

A check of other names like Coinbase (COIN), Robinhood (HOOD), Bullish (BLSH) and Gemini finds more sharp losses in the 5%-6% range.

Though still holding at the $108,000 area, bitcoin remained sizably lower after touching $114,000 on Tuesday. On Wall Street, the Nasdaq was sporting a 1% decline, with the chipmakers particularly hard hit.

BTC miners AI trade cools off

The steep drawdown in BTC miners suggest that their multi-month rally, fueled by investor optimism for obtaining lucrative data center deals, fizzled out as markets turned risk-off.

At the peak of the AI and high-performance computing bull run, the combined market capitalization of related companies exceeded $95 billion. It has since declined to around $82 billion, according to Farside data.

Bitfarms (BITF) surged more than 400% from September but has since fallen about 40%, now trading just above $4 per share. IREN (IREN), which was up roughly 400% year to date and 200% since September, is down around 30% from its all-time high of $73, currently trading near $52.