The total market value of 14 U.S.-listed Bitcoin miners hit a record high of $22.8 billion on June 15, according to a research report published by Wall Street bank JPMorgan.
The report emphasized that almost all of these companies outperformed Bitcoin in the first half of June. Core Scientific (CORZ) was the best performer, up 117%, while Argo Blockchain (ARBK) was down 7%. During the same period, Bitcoin, the world's largest cryptocurrency, fell by 3%.
Bitcoin mining stocks increased in the first half of the month, driven by positive reactions from investors to the news about Core Scientific's agreement with the artificial intelligence company CoreWeave.
The report also noted a continued decline in mining difficulty since the rewards were halved in April. “Network hashrate, a measure of industry competition and mining difficulty, has decreased by approximately 7 EH/s (1%) since May,” analysts Reginald Smith and Charles Pearce wrote.
US-listed miners are increasing their share of the network hashrate. In total, 14 companies now account for approximately 23.8% of the global network hashrate, representing an increase of approximately 1% compared to the previous month.
This is the second consecutive network hashrate increase for US miners, a sign that “inefficient private operators are scaling back their operations post-halving,” according to the bank.
*This is not investment advice.