Logo of jester cap with thought bubble.

Image source: The Motley Fool.

DATE

March 2, 2026

CALL PARTICIPANTS

  • Chief Executive Officer — Adam Sullivan
  • President — Matt Brown
  • Chief Financial Officer — Jim Nygaard

Need a quote from a Motley Fool analyst? Email [email protected]

TAKEAWAYS

  • Energized Capacity -- Approximately 350 megawatts energized as of the week of the call, with close to 200 megawatts billing; this surpasses the halfway milestone on the CoreWeave contract.
  • CoreWeave Contract Execution -- At year-end, 213 megawatts were energized, with more than 185 megawatts of billable capacity delivered; nearly 100 megawatts were billing, and the full 590 megawatt contract is targeted to be fulfilled by early 2027.
  • Dalton Site Expansion -- Dalton, Georgia to expand to 450 megawatts total gross power capacity, including 120 megawatts of uncommitted leasable customer capacity, supported by securing an additional 175 acres of land.
  • Pecos Site Conversion -- Leasable customer capacity at Pecos, Texas increased to 200 megawatts; site is being converted from Bitcoin mining to colocation, with conversion work underway and RFS expected within 12 months.
  • Hunt County Acquisition -- New agreement to acquire a 265-acre site in Hunt County, Texas, supporting an expected 430 megawatts gross and 285 megawatts customer leasable capacity, with power ramp starting in 2027 through 2029; closing expected by end of Q1.
  • Development Pipeline -- Total customer leasable capacity pipeline stands at approximately 1.5 gigawatts, including real, viable opportunities backed by existing contracted or near-contracted power.
  • 2025 Construction Highlights -- Five AI factory campuses delivered, representing 1 million square feet of data center shell, nearly $2 billion of installed infrastructure, over 5 million labor hours, and $5 billion in project investment.
  • Balance Sheet and Liquidity -- Liquidity at year-end totaled approximately $530 million.
  • Bitcoin Asset Sales -- Sold over 1,900 Bitcoin in January for approximately $175 million, reducing holdings to below 1,000 Bitcoin.
  • Financing Capacity -- Up to $4 billion in available financing against contracted capacity with CoreWeave is accessible at stabilization; project-based financing structures offer 60%-85% advance rates depending on customer credit quality and site characteristics.
  • Operational Tracking -- Management committed to only reporting megawatts upon start of billing for consistency.
  • Restatement of Historical Accounting -- Audit led to restatements of prior-period property, plant, and equipment treatment relating to site conversions, resulting in material weakness to be noted for four quarters but with "no impact to revenue, adjusted EBITDA, or our net cash flow" as CFO Jim Nygaard stated.
  • Growth Focus -- Priorities for 2026 are diversification of customer base and execution on the CoreWeave contract milestone delivery.

SUMMARY

Core Scientific (CORZ 1.81%) reported that energized and billing capacity expansion has outpaced major peers, marking significant execution on both customer and infrastructure fronts. The company announced key new site expansions—Dalton and Hunt County—to support future growth and the transition of more capacity to colocation. Financial positioning was reinforced by a strong year-end liquidity figure and strategic capital allocation, including substantial available project-based funding mechanisms. The management disclosed a historical accounting restatement event related to asset write-offs from mining site conversions, with no resulting impact on core financial performance. Looking forward, the pipeline of leasable capacity and active negotiations with investment-grade counterparties were emphasized as foundational to continued AI and colocation growth.

  • Management noted 500 megawatts under exclusivity arrangements "with a large investment-grade counterparty," with expectations for near-term colocation leasing agreements.
  • The "Operation Forward Observer" strategy advances development through initial commissioning to give the company a competitive advantage and greater certainty for customers regarding RFS timing.
  • CEO Adam Sullivan indicated pricing has shifted higher in recent months, driven by rising equipment and labor costs, and stated, "we have definitely seen pricing continue to shift."
  • Colocation revenue was limited in 2025, but billing for additional megawatts in coming months is anticipated to drive margin expansion and cover operating costs.
  • Technology stack evolution has necessitated the adaptation of site design to accommodate new GPU and TPU architectures, with future-proofing efforts underway to handle anticipated requirements.
  • Conversion of legacy Bitcoin mining sites to colocation is actively progressing, with mining operations currently managed to meet minimum power draw requirements, positioning the business for further shift toward AI infrastructure.

INDUSTRY GLOSSARY

  • Colocation: The leasing of space, power, and cooling for customers' IT hardware within a data center operated by another party, often including support for high-density AI or blockchain workloads.
  • Hyperscaler: A company providing large-scale cloud computing infrastructure and services, typically referring to firms like Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud, or Microsoft Azure.
  • RFS: "Ready for Service," indicating when data center capacity is prepared for customer usage and contractual billing may begin.
  • TPU: "Tensor Processing Unit," a custom-developed ASIC by Google designed to accelerate machine learning workloads in data centers.
  • Grace Blackwell GPU: NVIDIA's next-generation GPU platform optimized for AI and accelerated computing deployments in data center environments.

Full Conference Call Transcript

Adam Sullivan: On our October 30 update call, we laid out four specific deliverables for this earnings call. First, we expect to sign at least one new customer, an important step towards diversifying our customer base. Second, we plan to sign one new power expansion contract in an existing site. Third, we expected to sign a new large land and power agreement. And fourth, we plan on making a financing announcement. These are the building blocks for our future growth, expanding contracted revenue, increasing our power optionality, widening our footprint, and funding growth in a way that is responsible and repeatable. Before we talk about those four priorities, let us talk about execution.

The complexity of these buildouts is enormous, and we have made incredible progress on our core buildout despite challenges in the market and the evolving criteria for operating the newest generation of GPUs. This requires the deep bench that Core Scientific, Inc. has to adapt to changes in real time. Matt will cover the details, but here are the facts. As of this week, we will have energized approximately 350 megawatts of capacity, of which close to 200 megawatts are currently billing. This puts us well past the halfway mark of the CoreWeave contract. When we say energized, we mean power has been delivered and is generally within 90 days of billing.

The natural lag between energization and billing commencement varies by site and customer requirements. Now let us put that in perspective. Last year, we energized as many megawatts as our closest publicly traded peers combined. We were building and delivering while they were still signing their first AI contracts. And going forward, to keep this simple and consistent, we will report megawatts when they start billing. In this business, the market will always talk about demand. Investors should stay focused on what actually matters here: execution. Schedules will always move. It is easy at mile two of a marathon to say that you are on pace. These are large and complex projects that expose who can actually execute.

We have shown we can build, turn on capacity at scale, and deliver for our customers. This leads directly into our pipeline. As this industry matures and evaluates opportunities against a more stringent criteria, we are confident we check those boxes through proven execution and true site readiness. And we are disciplined. We only sign contracts we know we can deliver on time and done right. That discipline is how we are building a durable, long-standing company, one defined by execution and known for being a great partner to our customers. That is what we set out to do, and it is exactly what we are doing today.

And over time, that is what will separate us from the rest of the industry and position us to be a market leader for years to come. Now let me start by providing an update on the most visible item on our priority list, a new customer contract. We did not sign one by this call; we are not satisfied with that. But the demand is there. We have two sites under short exclusivity arrangements. We expect that this exercise will result in colocation leasing agreements in the near future. Our funnel is larger and broader than it was a few months ago, and we are in active discussions with hyperscalers, neoclouds, and large enterprises.

This is a timing issue, not a demand issue. While we were operating under the merger agreement, hyperscalers simply would not engage with us. Those conversations restarted following termination, and we have made significant headway. Deals at this level are not a one-meeting exercise. It is a rigorous, multistep process. While hyperscalers have a longer contracting process, the path to project financing and delivery can oftentimes be more straightforward. The bottom line is we are engaged, moving through the process, and competing for the right long-term opportunities. On neoclouds, there is meaningful demand across the industry. However, for those deals to work for us, there needs to be a strong balance sheet standing behind the contract.

In most cases, that means a hyperscaler, chip manufacturer, or another investment-grade guarantee. Putting that structure in place requires the due diligence of both the neocloud and investment-grade guarantee, which adds more coordination and steps. And because these guarantees are new for many parties, they take time to negotiate and finalize. This is one reason we believe you have seen fewer neocloud deals announced across the industry recently. We are not going to compromise on counterparty strength because that protection matters over the life of the contract. Second, we said we plan to add new power at an existing site. We delivered in Dalton, Georgia.

Dalton will expand to 450 megawatts of total gross power capacity, including 120 megawatts of uncommitted leasable customer capacity. Our Dalton site is strategically located about 90 miles from Atlanta, sitting in the middle of an incredibly attractive demand corridor. We have been working towards this expansion with local stakeholders for over a year. And to support it, we have secured an additional 175 acres of land. This is what execution looks like: long-term planning, deep coordination, and strong partnerships with utilities and the local community. Late last year, we also increased leasable customer capacity in Pecos, Texas to 200 megawatts, an area that has seen significant traction for high-density compute.

Given that demand, we are moving forward with the conversion of Pecos from Bitcoin mining to colocation. Pecos is in the Goldilocks zone for customers signing, meaning we have secured a general contractor, locked in long-lead equipment, and conversion work is underway with a timeline to RFS within 12 months. This means Pecos is within a time frame that customers are actively trying to solve for right now. Stepping back, our strategy remains the same. We expect every megawatt in our portfolio to be dedicated to colocation within the next three years. Third, we delivered on signing a new large land and power agreement through our contract to acquire a major new site in Hunt County, Texas.

This site represents approximately 265 acres that we expect can support roughly 430 megawatts of gross power capacity and 285 megawatts of customer leasable capacity. This location is about 45 miles outside of Dallas, in one of the fastest-growing colocation markets. We expect this to close by the end of Q1. And importantly, this site has a clear interconnection path. The ERCOT energization schedule was approved in 2024, with power expected to begin coming online in 2027 and ramp through 2029. You have also seen the headlines around ERCOT. In our view, more discipline and transparency in that process is constructive. It helps reduce speculation and rewards companies with real sites, real plans, and the ability to execute.

We believe this makes our two leasable sites in Texas, both Hunt and Pecos, even more attractive in the market given the clarity around their ability to deliver. As we sit here today, our pipeline is approximately 1.5 gigawatts of customer leasable capacity. This number is not a speculative position. It is not inflated with load studies. It only includes real opportunities with a clear line of sight to development, existing power under contract, new sites like Hunt, and available incremental power at both new and existing sites. Power matters, and we stay disciplined on it. On the broader market, power is often treated as the bottleneck. We think that can be overstated.

In practice, the bigger constraints are often securing long-lead equipment and lining up experienced general contractors and subcontractors. The reality is simple. We already have more power in our pipeline than we can build over the next several years. And fourth, on financing. Our balance sheet remains strong, and we have a variety of financing options that Jim will cover here shortly. Looking at 2026, our priorities are straightforward. Diversify our customer base and execute on the CoreWeave contract. We are focused on delivery, disciplined growth, and doing what we said we would do. I will now turn it over to Matt to give an updated construction overview.

Matt Brown: Thanks, Adam. Through 2025, our teams executed with intensity and precision. We stayed focused on what matters: our customers and building the infrastructure powering the fourth industrial revolution. Our mission is simple: design to deliver AI factories at scale, purpose-built for accelerated computing. Every quarter felt like new architecture cycles, new GPUs, higher power densities, and new cooling paradigms that created extraordinary opportunity and real complexity. We maintained operations through unprecedented weather events across multiple regions, iterated designs in real time to support the newest GPU platforms, and applied lessons from prior deployments to better align infrastructure delivery with evolving customer needs. Each challenge refined the system. Each build made the thinking machine better.

Now let me take a step back and frame the magnitude of what the team accomplished over the last 14 months. Alongside our design-build partners, we broke ground on five AI factories supporting our 590 megawatt commitment to CoreWeave: two brownfield expansions, Denton, Texas and Marble, North Carolina; three greenfield campuses, Muskogee, Oklahoma; Dalton Phase 1; and Phase 2 in Georgia. In 2025, these five sites represented 1 million square feet of data center shell, nearly $2 billion of installed infrastructure assets, more than 5 million labor hours supported by an average of 200 to 300 workers on-site, and over $5 billion in total project investment. This is one of the most significant AI expansions underway anywhere in the world.

Let us start with Texas. Our 262 megawatt, 400,000 square foot Denton campus made remarkable progress. By the end of Q4, Denton delivered 67 billable megawatts across three buildings, with roughly half the campus energized. Today, Denton North is fully operational, running production GPU workloads, and represents 90 billable megawatts. At Denton South, the first 41 megawatt data hall has commenced billing and, as of today, our next 41 megawatt data hall will begin the energization process. The remaining buildings on the South Campus remain on track for Q2 energization with full campus completion by midyear. Denton alone currently represents approximately 130 billable megawatts actively supporting more than 50,000 Grace Blackwell GPUs.

In North Carolina, our 65 megawatt, 150,000 square foot Marble data center achieved full site energization in 2025. Two of the three data halls were delivered by the end of the fourth quarter, representing 36 billable megawatts supporting approximately 15,000 Grace Blackwell GPUs. The third and final data hall is currently in commissioning and is expected to be delivered in the second quarter. Our customer is actively accelerating GPU deployments at the site this week. Next, at our Muskogee, Oklahoma campus, Phase 1, a 70 megawatt, 138,000 square foot data center has completed vertical construction and is now fully energized and has advanced into commissioning, remaining on track for full delivery in the second quarter.

Finally, our Dalton, Georgia campus Phase 1, a 30 megawatt, 52,000 square foot data center, has also completed vertical construction and is now fully energized. Commissioning is progressing and preparing the facility for high-density liquid-cooled AI systems with full delivery expected in the second quarter. Then at Dalton Phase 2, a 145 megawatt, 250,000 square foot data center, vertical construction is currently underway with full delivery targeted for early 2027. This facility will serve as the final AI factory supporting CoreWeave's 590 megawatt commitment. Looking ahead, I want to outline our development and go-to-market strategy: Operation Forward Observer.

This strategy is straightforward: advance development across multiple sites through the first commissioned data hall while simultaneously securing long-lead equipment to enable rapid expansion. By progressing sites to this advanced stage before contract signing, we position ourselves ahead of our peers, winning colocation agreements. This approach provides customers with a high degree of certainty around RFS timelines, not only for the initial delivery but also for seamless expansion into subsequent data halls. Executing this strategy strengthens our competitive positioning and enhances our leverage in negotiating favorable terms with a broad base of creditworthy customers. Let me walk through our initial Forward Observer sites.

First is the Hunt campus, a planned 285 leasable megawatt AI campus strategically located near the Dallas–Fort Worth market. Our development teams are actively engaged in predevelopment work to deliver the full 285 megawatts across multiple buildings with initial delivery currently planned in 2027. Next, our Pecos campus, a planned 200 leasable megawatt campus in West Texas. Our development teams are mobilized and advancing early civil work and engineering on Phase 1, which is designed to deliver 185 megawatts of leasable capacity across multiple data halls with initial delivery expected to begin in early 2027. At Dalton, Phase 3 will consist of approximately 120 megawatts of leasable capacity across multiple data halls, with initial delivery targeted for 2027.

Development teams are mobilized and progressing through early civil work and engineering. Finally, construction is underway on the first phase of our 30 megawatt leasable data center in Auburn, Alabama. The site remains on track for its first 10 megawatts in 2026. Auburn is designed as a Tier III facility with dense connectivity, positioned to serve multitenant enterprise AI customers. Engineering, preconstruction, and permitting are complete, and all long-lead equipment is on-site. As we close, the takeaway is simple. We have built a repeatable execution engine for AI infrastructure at scale.

We delivered more than 185 megawatts of meaningful billable capacity, progressed multiple campuses through energization and commissioning, reached 350 megawatts energized, and expanded our development pipeline by 600 leasable megawatts to support the next wave of accelerated computing, all while continuing to enhance how we design, build, and onboard customers. Entering 2026, our priorities are clear: maintain alignment with customer GPU deliveries, stay ahead of the technology curve, and keep transforming megawatts into production-ready AI factories. Proud of what the team accomplished in 2025, and even more focused on the path ahead in 2026. With that, I will turn it over to Jim.

Jim Nygaard: Thanks, Matt. 2025 was a transitional year for the company. While the vast majority of our revenue continued to come from our Bitcoin mining operations, our primary focus was on scaling the colocation business, including the ongoing buildout of capacity for CoreWeave. At the same time, mining activities continued to support the funding of the company as we progressed through the transition. Although colocation revenue in 2025 was limited, we expect to reach an important inflection point in the coming months as we begin billing for additional megawatts, bringing colocation revenue to a level that will not only cover our operating costs, but also drive significant margin expansion going forward.

In terms of Bitcoin mining, we remain focused on operational optimization and will continue to mine to cover contractual power costs. We finished the year with a very strong balance sheet, with total liquidity of approximately $530 million. We also opportunistically sold just over 1,900 Bitcoin for approximately $175 million in January at materially higher prices above current market levels. At this time, we hold under 1,000 Bitcoin and expect to remain opportunistic going forward.

In terms of a broader capital formation strategy, we have a full range of financing options available that we will continue to evaluate in the coming months and quarters as our needs evolve, including both sizable alternatives at the corporate level and the up to $4 billion that we can raise against our contracted capacity with CoreWeave at stabilization. These capital sources will fund investments in our pipeline sites going forward. At these sites, we will also utilize project-based financing structures with 60% to 85% advance rates on build costs, depending on customer credit quality and site characteristics. Finally, I want to address the historical restatement outlined in our 10-Ks filing today.

In early 2025, we changed auditors to KPMG from Marcum. As part of KPMG's normal audit procedures, and our ongoing review of the conversion of legacy mining sites to colocation, we identified an error in our historical accounting going back to 2024 for certain property, plant, and equipment that was demolished as part of those conversions. Under the historical accounting treatment, demolition costs were capitalized and existing carrying values were maintained. It was determined that these values and expenses should have been written off in certain historical periods. We have filed amended statements to correct the error. Please refer to the SEC, or the Core Scientific, Inc. Investor Relations website for today's filings.

To clarify, there was no impact to revenue, adjusted EBITDA, or our net cash flow. And while you will see a material weakness noted in our filings for the next four quarters, rest assured we have taken the appropriate steps to strengthen our controls over non-routine accounting items going forward. As we look ahead, we are incredibly excited about the trajectory of our business. The demand backdrop for high-performance infrastructure remains strong, and we have positioned Core Scientific, Inc. to capitalize on that opportunity with scale, operational discipline, and a clear strategic vision. We are building a differentiated data center platform with the capabilities and balance sheet strength to compete at the highest level.

With an experienced and focused team, a growing pipeline, and a commitment to disciplined capital allocation, we believe we are not only well positioned for the coming year, but structurally set up to create meaningful long-term value for our shareholders. With that, I will turn the call over to the operator for questions.

Operator: Thank you. We will now open for questions. Our first question is from Jon Petersen with Jefferies. Please proceed.

Jon Petersen: Great. Thank you. Good afternoon, guys. Adam, you talked about two deals that are, I guess, in discussion right now. Can you give us some more details on the potential sizes of those deals? Maybe what locations those might be in? And then I am also just kind of curious about your selectivity around the type of tenants that you are willing to talk with right now, and how important credit quality is.

Adam Sullivan: Yes, happy to, and thanks for the question, Jon. It is helpful to look back at October 30 when we first emerged from the termination of the merger agreement. One of the things that we talked about is that we were engaged with a number of different counterparties, including neoclouds. But at the time, hyperscaler customers and certain large investment-grade counterparties were not willing to speak with us during that time, which was understandable. Where we have migrated our sales pipeline over the course of the past four months, as we have continued, we have engaged with those large counterparties once again, which has been great to see.

We are in discussions across a number of them with a number of our sites. And the one thing I will say is, today, we sit with 500 megawatts under exclusivity arrangements with a large investment-grade counterparty that we are excited to continue to advance forward, and we are really looking forward to hopefully signing one of those over the near future.

Jon Petersen: All right. And as a follow-up, in your presentation, you list 700 megawatts of unannounced leasable customer power opportunities. Is that additional power you might get at existing land sites? New land sites? How do we think about what that bucket is exactly?

Adam Sullivan: Yes, that is really just a combination of both of those items. There are places where we might be waiting to sign certain extensions on power in an existing site due to certain collateral requirements until we are closer on customer signing. Or it might be sites that we have under exclusivity or are completing due diligence, but have the confidence to be able to bring those to customer conversations as opportunities that we can present to them.

Jon Petersen: Alright. That is helpful. Thank you.

Adam Sullivan: Thank you.

Operator: Our next question is from Brett Knoblauch with Cantor Fitzgerald. Please proceed.

Brett Knoblauch: Hi, guys. Thanks for taking my question. Adam, on the new site in Hunt County, I think for the most part the deals we have seen get signed are on maybe sites with energized power today. Obviously, this is not going to be energized until next year. Could you talk about maybe the level of confidence you have in being able to get a lease signed for that site even though power is going to be delivered at a later date? And then maybe just as one follow-up from a demand perspective and maybe pricing perspective, it feels like the deals have gotten better month after month, quarter after quarter.

Are you guys seeing that on your end when you are having conversations with respective tenants? Just curious about your thoughts on the overall pricing environment.

Adam Sullivan: Yes. I mean, for us, really, it does not matter if the power is available today, because it is going to take time for us to construct and build that site. So as long as the power and the ramp schedule that we have been provided by the utility matches with our construction schedule, that is acceptable to potential customers. We feel great about the Hunt site. As we see it today, the site is not impacted by Senate Bill 6 or any of the recent ERCOT changes, and we have also been told that this project will not be restudied by ERCOT.

So it gives us a lot of confidence in that site and that project, and we are excited about building out another large-scale campus just outside of Dallas. And to your follow-up, yes, we have definitely seen pricing continue to shift. Part of that is driven by equipment prices and labor prices continuing to rise in the market, so you are seeing a similar move in terms of leasing economics.

That is one of the reasons why we launched our project with securing long-lead equipment, securing trades at sites, and beginning civil work across a number of different locations, so that we could lock in economics at those sites—essentially locking in what our costs are going to look like—while we are still in an environment where we are seeing lease rates continue to move higher. That approach is protective for our business, but it is also an offensive approach for us to continue to attack the market and put ourselves in a position to really compete on deals with hyperscalers, because they are expecting capacity delivered sub-18 months, in some cases sub-12 months.

And so for us to be able to put ourselves in those positions, we have to be making the moves that we are making today related to really securing site readiness around these new locations.

Brett Knoblauch: Perfect. Thank you, guys. Appreciate it.

Adam Sullivan: Thanks.

Operator: Our next question is from Darren Aftahi with ROTH Capital Partners. Please proceed.

Darren Aftahi: Hey, everybody. Thanks for taking my questions. Good afternoon. Two, if I may. Just on the Hunt County site, could you talk about what the rough payment was? And then I know you said it would be energized in 2027. How does that kind of energization scale up? And then follow-up, Jim, you made a comment about financing against the CoreWeave when there is stabilization. Can you just kind of enlighten us what that actually means and perhaps that is six months after all of the campuses are built out? Thanks.

Adam Sullivan: Yes. Thanks, Darren. We will be announcing further details related to the Hunt County site as that site gets to close later in this quarter. As it relates to energization, as we look at the megawatts, there are tail megawatts here, but really the energization schedule ramps along with what our construction schedule looks like. We feel good about how that site looks today in terms of our site readiness and our ability to deliver against the ramp schedule provided by the utility. We think that puts that site in a very strong box in terms of checking a number of different criteria that both hyperscalers as well as other large offtake companies may have.

So we are excited about that site and how that continues to move forward. I will let Jim take the last question you had.

Jim Nygaard: Thanks, Adam. When you look at the size of our contract with CoreWeave at 590 megawatts, it represents somewhere between $5 billion and $5.5 billion of total infrastructure. So when I say stabilization and I indicate the availability of capital up to $4 billion, I am referencing the full stabilization of the contract relative to the asset base that we are constructing. The reality is that this is different than what is more commonly structured in project finance terms where you are borrowing the money up front and building later. We have substantial availability under that asset base to borrow a good portion of that $4 billion today.

But the scaling is quite fast because we are already at such significant progress on the build. We will get through the vast majority of that before the end of this year.

Darren Aftahi: Appreciate it. Thank you.

Jim Nygaard: No problem.

Operator: Our next question is from B. Riley Securities. Please proceed.

Henry Hurl: Thank you, operator. This is Henry Hurl on for Nick Giles. I wanted to follow up on the new Hunt County site. Specifically, what does the site look like today? And are there any preliminary permits that are needed before construction can begin? Thanks.

Adam Sullivan: Yes, I appreciate the question. So today, the site is essentially—what we have to do to energize that site is there is still a substation that needs to be built. And so when we look at the utility energization schedule and the construction schedule, we feel like we can start energizing that site in late 2027. But that is going to require us to start to get the process rolling both in terms of our preconstruction activities and getting the substation going here in pretty short order.

Henry Hurl: And then just on preliminary permits for construction, any color on that?

Adam Sullivan: We have gone through pretty much all of the ESA Phase I studies and geotechnicals for the site. We have schematic designs in place, and so we have a pretty good idea on the development strategy for that site. It is really just a matter of finalizing design docs, getting to IFPs, and then releasing those for permitting.

Henry Hurl: Okay. Great. Thanks so much. Continued best of luck.

Operator: Our next question is from George Sutton with Craig-Hallum Capital Group. Please proceed.

George Sutton: Thank you. Matt, you referenced new architectures and cooling and also new GPUs, and that sounds like a bit of a frustration. I am just curious how, as you are developing new sites, how much change you are seeing relative to the prior sites?

Matt Brown: Yes. So the evolution of the technology stack, obviously, when you are building projects that are taking 12 to 18 months to get out of the ground, and you are going through sort of multiple technology changes, trying to adapt to those in real time. In our case, we started our very first data center with CoreWeave with H100s, then we quickly evolved into NVIDIA's first iteration of Grace Blackwell NVL36s, then NVL72s, and then from the GB200 platforms into the GB300 platforms, and having to adapt the data halls in flight to those technology iterations.

Then recently, NVIDIA released its reference architecture for Rubin and Vera, and so we have a pretty good idea of what that paradigm shift is going to start to look like from a cooling and power distribution standpoint. I would say our teams are starting to factor those changes into our new projects so that we are future-proofed in terms of what we are expecting to happen next. In addition, Google and the TPUs are becoming more prevalent in the market.

We are also evaluating how we take our standardized base of design so that we have a very predictable, repeatable approach to putting product in the market that is both adaptable to what we are doing today and what we are expecting from NVIDIA tomorrow, and these new chipsets coming to market like TPUs. As those become more prevalent, even outside the Google ecosystem, we are able to adapt our data halls to those shifts as well. So a lot of moving parts, a lot of things happening in the technology ecosystem. Our engineering and development teams are, I think, well ahead of the curve in thinking about how we adapt to those.

George Sutton: Very helpful. And then just a follow-up for Adam. You mentioned the broader and larger funnel of groups that you are talking to, but you also have suggested that we need investment-grade guarantees at some point. How broad can that funnel really be relative to those guarantees? Are you seeing that availability?

Adam Sullivan: Yes. I would say we are seeing a pretty wide range, and that range has continued to widen. It is helpful to think back on 2025, think back at the demand from both neoclouds and from AI labs. In 2025, you essentially did not really see many new deals being announced. That changed dramatically, obviously, in Q3 as guarantees were introduced into the market. We saw some deals backed by Google. And I believe, over time, we are going to continue to see the evolution of these guarantees. The ones that we have seen so far come from wide and varying sources.

We listed hyperscalers, chip manufacturers, and other large investment-grade guarantors, and that is really what we are seeing in the market. It is a wide range. They look different, all the way from debt guarantees to full lease guarantees, so they cover the full spectrum. I think what we are going to see over 2026 is really a centralization on terms related to those guarantees and wrappers that exist in the market.

I think some of the delay and pause you have seen in some of the neocloud and lab signing over the course of the past three months has more been related to what those guarantees are going to look like, because I do not think they are going to look like they have in the past. We are in the process of negotiating with certain guarantee counterparties here, and we are hopeful that these counterparties begin to centralize on the right guarantee in order for data center developers to go out and fund these developments.

Operator: Our next question is from Mike Donovan with Compass Point. Please proceed.

Mike Donovan: Hi. Thanks for taking my question. In prepared remarks, you stated you have more power in your pipeline than you can build over the next few years. Can you share a range of megawatts you are confident you can bring online per year? And are there any areas of concern today around supply chain or labor availability?

Adam Sullivan: Yes, I appreciate the question. In terms of what we think is an order of magnitude of what we think we can develop, a lot of that is going to be really customer-driven. We announced our strategy that we are progressing multiple sites through the design-build process into 2027. As customers step into those, that is really going to drive the scalability and the pace of acceleration in terms of how many megawatts we build out. In previous quarters, I think we have guided around the idea that we could, in theory, build out as much as 500 megawatts in a single calendar year.

I think that certainly could be possible, but that is going to require customers stepping into these projects pretty early so that we can line up the financing and line up the supply chain in order to scale those out. To that order of magnitude of development, our internal capacity to take on a half gigawatt in a year to 18-month time frame is something we feel really comfortable with. It is really a matter of lining up economics and financing to support that strategy. Hopefully, that answers your question.

Mike Donovan: Okay. Appreciate that added color.

Operator: Our next question is from John Hickman with Ladenburg Thalmann. Please proceed.

John Hickman: Hi. Could you elaborate on your comments right up front? You talked about the billing—there is a 90-day delay in when you energize and when you get the bill. Is that what you were telling us? And then I think I missed this number, but as of the end of the year, how many megawatts had you delivered to CoreWeave?

Matt Brown: I can handle this first part of that. So what we are referring to is, as we turn on power to a building—so we achieve our energization milestone of hydrating all the equipment with electrons—from that point, each data hall within the building has to go through its subsequent commissioning phases: the fully commissioned testing and go through all the integrated testing to operationalize each of those data halls within that structure. From the time we start energization to the time that we fully commission those data halls could roughly range into the 90-day time horizon for which we would expect to turn on revenue.

On your second question, at the end of calendar year 2025, we had energized 213 megawatts by the end of the calendar year. We had fallen just slightly short of our 250 goal—one data hall short of our goal. But as we have said in this earnings call, we have more than made our way back ahead of schedule with 350 megawatts energized and nearly 100 megawatts billing. The step function of progress over the last couple months has been pretty remarkable.

John Hickman: And you said that kind of by midyear you would have it all energized?

Adam Sullivan: By the end of—or basically, going into 2027 or the early part of 2027—the full contract should be fulfilled and fully delivered to CoreWeave.

John Hickman: Okay.

Adam Sullivan: Okay. Thank you. Appreciate the color.

Operator: Our next question is from Kevin Dede with H.C. Wainwright. Please proceed.

Kevin Dede: Adam, Matt, thanks for having me on. Adam, can you drill in a little bit about Alabama? It just seems to be a little bit of an outlier at 30 megawatts. I am just wondering how you sort of process that in the grand scheme of landing hyperscalers.

Adam Sullivan: Yes, absolutely, Kevin, and thanks for the question. The 30 megawatt site in Alabama is a site that we saw early on as a location that could move quickly. We also recognized the power constraints in Georgia and recognized the low latency that Auburn had available to it. That is a site that we believe, sitting here today based on our customer conversations, has interest across a number of different potential counterparties. It is something that we are using to entice customers on larger contracts. One thing important to note is that hyperscalers are not only focused on the larger sites and larger campuses; they are also looking for backfill across certain locations to serve certain markets.

We think Alabama, and Auburn specifically, serves that very well. So we are excited about that project, and we are looking forward to landing a customer there as well.

Kevin Dede: So do you think it sort of fits the bill for an inference type solution? And if that is the case, is Matt sort of reorganizing the way sites are constructed and fitting potential use case changes?

Adam Sullivan: Yes, it is definitely going to be utilized for inference use cases. But Matt, I will let you take it related to infrastructure design.

Matt Brown: Auburn is unique from a couple different standpoints. One, it has the makings of a much more traditional, multitenant data center—Tier III-type facility—with multiple 10,000 square foot data halls, high degrees of security, and a mass amount of connectivity. So more akin to what you might find in a Digital Realty or a modern Equinix-type facility. From that standpoint, we look at Auburn as really an entry point both in terms of inferencing AI loads, but also in terms of the enterprise segment as well.

Since the enterprise segment tends to be on a smaller deal size and smaller deal constructs, with the needs for dense connectivity and carrier-neutral environments with the type of infrastructure that is laid out there, it makes it ideal for a number of different customer segments, both on AI and on some of the non-AI segments as well. In terms of adjusting to inferencing versus large language model sites, from a technology standpoint we do not see a ton of difference in the way the power density needs are between those.

What we might see happening is that the cluster sizing might be slightly different between an inference cluster and a large language model cluster, driving a little bit more segmentation potentially within the campus at some point. That is generally what we think is happening today.

Kevin Dede: Adam, before I get the hook, and nobody has really asked about Bitcoin mining—and I know it is not a priority, but it is still the lion's share of revenues for a little while anyway—can you give us some insight on how you expect this year to fall out from a hash rate perspective? And whether or not you are chasing down those Block miners that you thought you might look at the end of last year?

Adam Sullivan: Yes, absolutely. It has been interesting to watch what is happening in the mining environment. We are seeing hash price go to levels that have never been seen before. Dipping below $0.03 was definitely something that I think folks thought might happen probably in 2027 or 2028, given where machine efficiency is today. For us, that business is still essentially in runoff today. We are trying to manage our machine fleet based on what our minimum power draw requirements are across a number of different sites, and that is something that we are going to continue to operate over the course of this year.

We are really just optimizing right now to ensure that we are hitting our minimum power draw requirements across our portfolio. In terms of Block units, those units are getting installed today, and that is something that is going to help us maintain productivity across our mining portfolio and really help us hit—given that a majority of our machine fleet is anywhere from four to five years old today—those minimum power draw requirements profitably.

Kevin Dede: So where does Bitcoin mining stand at the end of this year as you look at how your sites are converted?

Adam Sullivan: It is something that is continuing to evolve, Kevin. We are building next door at many of these locations, which is why we have been acquiring additional land across our portfolio. So it really will come offline as we are transferring that power over to a data center.

Kevin Dede: Perfect. Got it. Okay. Thank you for entertaining them all, Adam. I really appreciate it. Congrats on the progress.

Adam Sullivan: Thanks, Kevin.

Operator: Our next question is from John Todaro with Needham & Company. Please proceed.

John Todaro: Hey, guys. Thanks for taking my question, and congrats on the progress so far. There has been some conversations of NVIDIA backstopping a number of neoclouds. It would potentially open up the type of customers you guys could sign with by quite a bit. Just wondering if that is starting to happen in some lease discussions—any commentary there?

Adam Sullivan: Yes. I think we are going to see all chip manufacturers start to begin to play the game of guarantees to help them secure their customers moving forward and really lock in architecture and the data center around their GPU chipset. It is definitely something we have seen, and it is something that is going to continue to evolve as I noted earlier. But I would expect both hyperscalers and chip manufacturers to continue to march down the path of looking to provide guarantees for both neoclouds as well as labs.

John Todaro: Okay. Understood. And then beyond just the terms, but on lease rates: as we think about some of the latest-gen architecture and maybe a little bit higher CapEx spend from a data center operator side, and also maybe the use case changes that we heard in your response to Kevin, are leasing rates going to start moving quite a bit higher from historically what we have seen signed here, ranging from you guys having one of the first leases to the more recent one with Hunt? Should we expect that to start materially moving higher?

Adam Sullivan: I would not necessarily say materially moving higher. I think in the market, what we have seen are lease rates move generally a bit higher in relation to what the CapEx is on those builds. I would not say that, where we sit here today, we are going to see something material outside of the bounds of what has been signed historically. But I do believe that over the course of 2026, we may see a little bit more normalization and a touch movement higher in terms of lease rates.

That is really just driven by the fact that many of the hyperscalers price their data centers based on a yield, and they know how much their base of design costs.

John Todaro: Yep. Yep. That makes a lot of sense. Understood. Thank you, and congrats on the progress.

Adam Sullivan: Thanks, John.

Operator: Our next question is from Ben Summers from BTIG. Please proceed.

Ben Summers: Hey, good afternoon, guys, and thanks for taking my question. Kind of building off that last question, I am curious if you are seeing any sort of bifurcation of more urban-located sites and the potential pricing there. I guess, demand profile for those sites and how that could potentially lead to maybe improved pricing on a site like Hunt County that is right near one of the largest data center hubs in the U.S.? And then just one more if I may—sorry if I missed this earlier—any timeline around Kentucky and North Dakota and any comments on the demand for those sites for potential HPC contracts?

Adam Sullivan: Yes. As we look at Hunt, there is definitely better pricing capacity for us and for data center developers more broadly when you are within a certain latency band back to a major metropolitan market. In relation to more urban environments, that is not necessarily a game that we play in; that is more of the Equinix/Digital Realty type model. But I would expect to see our pricing for sites that are closer to major metropolitan areas be stronger than sites that might be further away from major metro areas. There is that pricing bifurcation, and some of that is related to dual use case.

When you are closer to the major metropolitan area, it can be used for both LLMs as well as inference. The other part here is also time to RFS. Something that we talked about in our prepared remarks: time to RFS is really the trump card for data center developers. The closer you are to RFS, the better pricing power you have. On Kentucky and North Dakota, they are under discussions with a number of different counterparties. They are in our priority list, albeit the projects that Matt Brown walked through earlier are our focus points today.

Operator: There are no further questions at this time. That will conclude today's conference. You may disconnect your lines at this time and have a wonderful day.