Marathon Digital Holdings Inc

StarkWare announced today that it has successfully processed the first Bitcoin transaction resistant to quantum computers, a development that challenges the conventional wisdom that a hard fork is the only way to protect Bitcoin from quantum threats. Avihu Levy, head of applications at StarkWare, devised a method to add a special lock using a technique called signature grinding to prevent public key data from being exposed while transactions wait in the mempool, a period vulnerable to attacks from future quantum computers. The method is intentionally costly and can take hours to process per transaction, and because the transaction format is too unusual for regular nodes to accept, it must be sent directly to miners willing to accept it. MARA mined the transaction through its Slipstream service. Despite this discovery, Levy still supports protocol upgrades for long-term security, with StarkWare CEO Eli Ben-Sasson stating that this method provides psychological assurance and acts as a lifeboat, but we should not relax and should build more lifeboats now.

Moderna delivered one of the largest single-session moves for an S&P 500 company, closing 177% higher at $174.38 on Wednesday after reporting positive late-stage data for its personalized cancer vaccine. The stock pulled back over 23% on Thursday before adding more than 10% so far on Friday, leaving it on course for a gain of around 135% over the week. The Phase 3 trial evaluated Moderna's intismeran alongside Merck's Keytruda in advanced skin cancer, and met its primary goal of recurrence-free survival, with a key secondary endpoint on distant metastasis-free survival also met and no new safety signal reported. Crypto-exposed equities rallied hard this week after bitcoin surged on the U.S. Treasury's decision to at least double the size of its long-dated bond buyback operations, alongside supportive comments on the sector from President Donald Trump. The Treasury raised the maximum per-operation size from $2 billion to at least $4 billion for the 10-to-20-year and 20-to-30-year sectors, effective Sept. 9 through Nov. 4. Bitcoin is currently above $77,000, having hit a high of $79,461 earlier in Friday's session. As a result, Strategy has risen 25.9% over the week, with Marathon Digital up 22.5%, Coinbase 23.1% higher, Circle up 16.3%, Galaxy Digital 12.3% higher and Robinhood up 9.7%. The same Treasury announcement also lifted metals producers, with the dollar weakening and precious metal prices moving higher. Agnico Eagle leads the group so far on Friday with an 18.4% gain over the week, followed by Barrick at 15%, Freeport-McMoRan up 14% and Newmont 13.3% higher. The dollar has declined, with spot gold gaining more than 2% on Friday and over 6% in the past week. Estée Lauder jumped more than 16% on Wednesday and is set to finish the week up around 15.9% after fourth-quarter results came in ahead of expectations. Sales rose 6%, beating consensus of 4%, while adjusted earnings of $0.39 per share topped the $0.32 expected. Management pointed to share gains in mainland China and growth across all product categories except hair care, alongside continued progress on cost-cutting through its One ELC initiative and Profit Recovery and Growth Plan. Canaccord analyst Susan Anderson raised her price target for the stock to $90 from $85, maintaining a Hold rating following the release. Walmart is the week's notable loser, sinking 9.2% on Thursday and down a further 0.9% so far on Friday after second-quarter results that beat on the headline numbers but disappointed on the metric that mattered most. Comparable sales at Walmart-only U.S. stores excluding gas grew 2.6%, well short of the 3.67% consensus and the slowest U.S. sales growth in six years. Mizuho analyst David Bellinger described the outcome as a worst-case scenario, calling it a very messy print and one of the biggest misses in years from the retailer.

Crypto-linked stocks rallied Friday as Bitcoin extended its climb to levels not seen since late May, after President Trump called on lawmakers to pass clear regulatory rules for digital assets. In U.S. premarket trading, Strategy was up 10.2%, Coinbase rose 6.8%, and Circle Internet Group added 6.4%, while MARA Holdings climbed 5.4%, Galaxy Digital rose 5%, Robinhood Markets gained 4.7%, Hut 8 advanced 2.4%, and Riot Platforms rose 3.7%. Bitcoin jumped 8.9% to $78,135.60, briefly touching an intraday high of $79,600.60, breaking out of the roughly $60,000-to-$70,000 range that held for most of 2026. The rally was also supported by a broader lift in risk appetite after the U.S. Treasury Department said it would double its bond buybacks in an effort to contain rising yields, following a sharp bond selloff that drove the 30-year yield to its highest level since 2007. The advance was set in motion earlier this week when Trump, speaking at a White House summit, urged Congress to advance the Clarity Act, closely watched legislation aimed at establishing a regulatory framework for the U.S. crypto industry, though it remains unclear when, or if, the bill will pass.

MARA Holdings shares surged 15.54 percent to $11.15 on Thursday as investors reacted to President Donald Trump's renewed push for Congress to speed up passage of the Clarity Act. The proposed federal law would establish a regulatory framework for cryptocurrencies by dividing oversight between the SEC and the CFTC, and its passage is expected to benefit crypto mining and treasury firms including MARA, which held 35,577 Bitcoins as of the first half of the year. Bitcoin climbed back to the $72,000 territory and further to $73,000 following Trump's comments, while Standard Chartered's Geoffrey Kendrick said traders should position for Bitcoin possibly hitting $100,000 by year-end. MARA recently reported a second-quarter net loss attributable to shareholders of $609.7 million, including a $343 million loss related to the fair value of digital assets, meaning any rebound in Bitcoin prices could prove critical to its recovery. The bill remains stalled in the Senate amid political disagreements and opposition from the banking industry, but a procedural vote is expected on September 15, making that date an important potential catalyst for crypto-related stocks.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the Clarity Act is at the '1-yard line', urging Congress to pass the landmark bill before recess, which sent bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies higher on Tuesday. Bitcoin rose 2.08% to $66,559, Ethereum added 1.00% to $1,922, and Dogecoin gained 1.62% to $0.073. Crypto stocks surged, with Cipher Digital up 18.01% to $24.24, Coinbase Global up 11.70% to $179.20, Riot Platforms up 8.64% to $21.62, Robinhood Markets up 8.58% to $107.80, MARA Holdings up 8.10% to $12.62, Circle Internet Group up 7.90% to $70.62, Hut 8 up 7.81% to $108.81, CleanSpark up 7.66% to $15.53, Bullish up 6.83% to $24.24, Figure Technology Solutions up 6.31% to $32.34, Bakkt up 5.22% to $8.26, IREN up 4.71% to $42.10, Gemini Space Station up 4.33% to $4.70, and Strategy up 3.67% to $101.41.

Hut 8 shares jumped 10% to $100.58 after the company signed a second 15-year, $9.8 billion lease that fully commercializes its 1-gigawatt Beacon Point AI data center campus in Texas. The existing high-investment-grade tenant doubled its contracted footprint to 704 megawatts, bringing the campus base-term contract value to $19.6 billion and as much as $50.2 billion if all renewal options are exercised. The total contracted portfolio value across Beacon Point and River Bend now reaches $26.6 billion, with expected average annual net operating income above $1.75 billion. Peer miners rallied in sympathy, with Marathon Digital up 8% to $11.57 and Riot Platforms up 4% to $19.03, while the WGMI Bitcoin-miner ETF rose 8% to $51.58. The sector gains came even as Bitcoin traded slightly lower, signaling the move is driven by AI infrastructure enthusiasm rather than crypto beta.

MARA Holdings shares jumped 10% after the company entered into a deal with synthetic renewable energy firm HIF USA to acquire land in Matagorda County, Texas. Costco Wholesale shares tumbled 4.2% after reporting decelerating June comparable sales growth. The Simply Good Foods rose 1.3% after posting third-quarter fiscal 2026 adjusted earnings of $0.42 per share, beating the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $0.35. Levi Strauss fell 2.2% following disappointing earnings per share guidance for fiscal 2026.

Mara Holdings shares surged after the company announced a deal to buy powered land from HIF USA for up to $600 million. The more than 1,200-acre site in Texas is projected to provide up to 2 gigawatts of grid capacity by April 2028, more than doubling Mara's total power capacity to about 4.8 gigawatts. Mara plans to build a digital infrastructure campus with Starwood Digital Ventures for AI and high-performance computing, including Bitcoin mining, with construction starting this year pending regulatory approval. The shift toward AI data centers is seen as potentially far more lucrative than its prior Bitcoin mining focus.

Stock futures edged higher on Monday as traders returned from the long weekend, with crypto-related stocks, Tesla, and United Microelectronics among the biggest movers. United Microelectronics rose 6% after reporting June revenue climbed 22.9% year-over-year to NT$23.1 billion, while first-half 2026 revenue increased 11.3% to NT$129.8 billion. Crypto stocks rallied as Bitcoin topped $63,000 for the first time in two weeks, lifting Strategy by 5% and pushing Circle Internet Group, Riot Platforms, Marathon Digital, Coinbase, and HIVE Digital Technologies up more than 3% each. Tesla gained 2% after expanding its Robotaxi service to Miami, building on last month's Austin launch and following record second-quarter deliveries of 480,126 vehicles. Kosmos Energy surged 5% on strong operational momentum, including the J76 well in Ghana adding about 20,000 barrels of oil per day and lifting Jubilee production above 85,000 barrels per day, while the company reduced net debt by more than $400 million since year-end 2025 to $2.56 billion.

TAE Power Solutions has shipped its first hybrid energy storage prototype system to MARA Holdings, marking the initial field deployment of the architecture under their strategic collaboration. The prototype will be installed at a MARA site for validation, tuning, and operational testing, advancing development of grid-responsive load management for power-intensive digital infrastructure. The hybrid system combines battery storage, ultracapacitors, advanced power electronics, and intelligent controls to handle sustained energy needs and fast-response power events, aiming to extend battery life by routing high-stress cycles through ultracapacitors. MARA plans to use the prototype as a development platform ahead of additional production deployments later this year, supporting the companies' focus on managing load variability and grid efficiency.

Marathon Digital Holdings is pivoting from pure bitcoin mining toward AI-focused data centers and has entered a development and financing partnership with Starwood Capital Group to build digital infrastructure. The alliance, announced in February 2026, targets roughly 1 GW of near-term IT capacity with a pathway to more than 2.5 GW, aiming to accelerate AI-related revenue and reduce upfront funding pressure. Marathon still faces near-term pressure from ongoing net losses and a mining-centric revenue base, with the key catalyst being evidence that AI data center projects begin contributing meaningfully to results. Baseline projections see $1.2 billion in revenue and $144.7 million in earnings by 2029, while some optimistic analysts had forecast about $2.0 billion in revenue and $605.5 million in earnings by 2028.

MARA Holdings is shifting from pure-play Bitcoin mining to providing power infrastructure for AI data centers, a move underscored by its recent acquisition of the Long Ridge Energy & Power facility from FTAI Infrastructure Inc. The 505-megawatt combined-cycle gas plant sits on 1,600 acres with expansion potential beyond 1 gigawatt, and MARA plans to use it to supply reliable, low-cost energy to high-performance computing customers. The company already controls 1.9 gigawatts of power infrastructure and boasts sector-leading energy costs of $0.04 per kilowatt hour at owned sites. Since the trade date referenced in a related portfolio analysis, MARA’s stock has returned 54 percent.