Shares of HIVE Digital Technologies Ltd. (HIVE) were moving higher in premarket trading Monday. The reason? The company is making a huge, capital-efficient bet on artificial intelligence computing.
Through its subsidiary BUZZ High Performance Computing, HIVE announced a major expansion of its AI data center footprint in Canada. The company is essentially supercharging its capacity, growing its liquid-cooled data center power from 4 megawatts to 16.6 megawatts. This expansion spans its existing operations in Manitoba and a brand-new facility in British Columbia, secured through a partnership with Bell Canada.
Here’s the clever part about the financing: HIVE says customer deposits scheduled for 2025 will secure this entire growth pipeline. That means the company doesn’t need to go out and raise a bunch of new capital or take on significant debt to fund this build-out. It’s a capex-light strategy, which is always music to investors' ears.
From Manitoba to British Columbia: The GPU Roadmap
So, what does this expansion actually look like on the ground? The new British Columbia facility comes online with an immediate 5 MW of capacity, which is enough to support roughly 2,000 of those high-powered, AI-optimized graphics processing units (GPUs) that are in such hot demand. There’s also an option to add another 7.6 MW at that site in 2027.
When you combine this with the capacity in Manitoba, HIVE now has a clear, near-term path to hosting over 4,000 GPUs. The company's ultimate target is to have 6,000 GPUs deployed across its Canadian operations by the end of its fiscal year on March 31, 2027.
The Financial Target: High-Margin AI Revenue
All this hardware isn't just for show. HIVE has attached a serious financial goal to this build-out. The company is targeting $200 million in contracted annualized run-rate revenue from these new enterprise GPU contracts by that same March 2027 date. Even more impressive is the projected profitability: HIVE expects these high-performance computing (HPC) contracts to come with EBITDA margins of around 75%.
Think about that for a second. For every dollar of revenue from these AI computing services, the company expects to keep 75 cents in earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization. That’s the kind of margin profile that gets growth investors very excited.
The Other Side of the Coin: Exiting Sweden
While the Canadian expansion is the growth story, HIVE is also managing a strategic retreat on another front. The company is winding down its ASIC-based Bitcoin mining operations in Sweden. This move comes after tax enforcement actions by Swedish authorities created an untenable situation.
But HIVE isn't just abandoning the facility. It's pivoting. The plan is to repurpose the 7 MW data center in Boden, Sweden, turning it into a Tier-III AI infrastructure site. This new facility will be built on NVIDIA’s GB300 GPU architecture, effectively swapping out Bitcoin miners for AI servers.
In a move to align management with shareholders through this significant transition, the company also granted 2,849,400 restricted stock units (RSUs) to its team, subject to a mandatory one-year vesting period.
What the Charts Are Saying
From a technical analysis perspective, the stock's picture is a bit mixed. As of this news, HIVE was trading about 1.8% below its 20-day simple moving average and 17.3% below its 50-day SMA, which typically signals some short-term weakness. Over the past year, shares are up about 21.7%, but they remain near their 52-week lows, suggesting the longer-term trend has been challenging.
The Relative Strength Index (RSI) sits at 45.20, which is smack in the middle of neutral territory—the stock isn't overbought or oversold. Meanwhile, the Moving Average Convergence Divergence (MACD) indicator is at -0.1187, with its signal line at -0.1419. Because the MACD is above the signal line, this indicates a bullish crossover. So, you have a neutral RSI alongside a bullish MACD signal, which points to conflicting momentum. The technical setup suggests potential for a move, but without a overwhelmingly strong directional bias.
What the Analysts Think
The analyst consensus on HIVE remains a Buy rating, with an average price target of $6.68. However, recent actions show some caution and recalibration. Rosenblatt maintained a Buy rating in February but lowered its price target to $4.50. B. Riley Securities also kept its Buy rating but trimmed its target to $6.00. In a more bearish move, Keefe, Bruyette & Woods downgraded the stock to Market Perform in late January and cut its target to $3.50.
In early trading Monday, HIVE shares were up 3.29% at $2.20, according to market data. The market appears to be giving an initial thumbs-up to this strategic pivot toward AI, even as the company navigates its exit from Bitcoin mining in Europe.
