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Cipher Digital (CIFR) has signed two landmark leases with AWS (15 years, $5.5 billion on Black Pearl) and Google/Fluidstack (10 years, $3.8 billion on Barber Lake), and both projects, scheduled for October 2026, are expected to generate between $669 million and $754 million in average annualized net operating income.
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Value investors are shifting from large-cap AI software stocks to physical infrastructure plays like Cipher Digital, which offers direct exposure to the power of AI development and the data center bottleneck without a premium valuation.
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With large-cap AI software names trading at triple-digit cash flow multiples, value-oriented investors are quietly rotating toward the physical layer of construction: power, land and data center capacity. The United States is projected to need at least 50 gigawatts of electrical capacity for AI by 2028, and that bottleneck is where unattractive infrastructure running below $30 a share starts to look poorly valued compared to the software stocks they ultimately drive.
With that in mind, here’s a stock trading below $30 that has already racked up roughly a decade of hyperscaler cash flow, but still sits well below Wall Street’s consensus target.
Crypto Mining (NASDAQ: CIFR)
Crypto mining (NASDAQ:CIFR), recently rebranded as Cipher Digital, is developing industrial-scale data centers and is transitioning from bitcoin mining to high-performance computing infrastructure rented to hyperscalers.
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Shares are still trading below $20, up 31.98% year to date and a staggering 415.34% over the past year. For a retail investor, that price keeps Cipher comfortably below the $30 ceiling, while leaving room for analysts’ average target of $30.53 and Morgan Stanley’s $40.50 high target.
The fundamentals reflect a company in full transformation. The market capitalization stands at close to $7.97 billion on 409 million shares outstanding, with a debt-to-equity ratio of 3.44 and a negative P/E of -10. Analyst coverage is bullish: 5 Strong Buy ratings and 9 Buy ratings, with zero Holds or Sells. Jefferies upgraded the stock to a Strong Buy on May 15 and HC Wainwright reiterated a Buy with a $30 target.
The bullish argument is based on contracted cash flows. Cipher has signed approximately $9.3 billion in contracted HPC revenue on 600 megawatts across two landmark leases: a 15-year, 300 MW lease with Amazon Web Services in Black Pearl generating approximately $5.5 billion with a ~100% NOI margin, and a 10-year, 300 MW lease with Fluidstack and Google in Barber Lake worth ~$3.8 billion with a margin NOI of ~86%. Both projects target momentum in October 2026, after which management expects approximately $669 million in average annualized net operating income from October 2026 to September 2036, rising to approximately $754 million by 2035. Capital providers are voting with their wallets: the Black Pearl bond was 6.5 times oversubscribed with about $13 billion in orders.