The stocks of DAT-structured companies continue to decline.
At least 12 companies that built their businesses around purchasing digital assets have recently shifted their focus to AI-related areas. Bloomberg emphasized that the change in strategy has not yet helped restore investor interest.
The stocks of DAT firms tracked by the publication in the US and Canada have shown a median decline of 43% since the beginning of the year. Many are trading below the net value of the assets they own, and management teams are exiting the business.
The journalists provided specific examples of business "transformation." For instance, Bitcoin-accumulating K Wave Media Ltd. switched to developing data centers—since its relaunch in May, its stock has fallen by 71%.
The shares of Lixte Biotechnology Holdings Inc. dropped by 33% after the company agreed to merge with a firm from the energy sector in June. AlphaTON Capital, which holds altcoins on its balance sheet, lost 33% after rebranding to Alpha Compute in April.
Bloomberg directly links the weakness of the DAT sector to the dynamics of the assets themselves.
Gregory Sichenzia, founder of the law firm Sichenzia Ross Ference Carmel LLP, succinctly described the change in sentiment: if last year nothing bad was expected from crypto-treasuries, this year the phrase itself has become a "dirty word."
In his opinion, the shift to AI looks logical—that is where major capital is currently flowing. The spending by tech giants like Alphabet and Microsoft, as well as startups OpenAI and Anthropic, on computing infrastructure has made companies related to data centers the best-performing stocks in major indices.
Nearly all firms in the top 10 by performance in the S&P 500 index produce products for data centers: among them are SanDisk, whose stock has risen more than 500%, as well as Dell Technologies, Intel, and Micron Technology.
Attempts to capitalize on the AI hype extend far beyond the crypto market. Bloomberg cites the example of shoe manufacturer Allbirds, which shifted toward computing infrastructure after its own stock plummeted and rebranded to Smartbird.
Among companies in the crypto industry, Bitcoin miners are currently having more success than DAT firms in reorienting towards AI. CoreWeave switched to cloud computing, which positively impacted its stock.
The quotes of Hut 8, Iren, and TeraWulf are also recovering after retooling their data centers for data centers.
Partner at Lowenstein Sandler Daniel Forman emphasized that investors are not completely abandoning the blockchain theme: interest remains in other areas of the technology, but not in the digital treasury model in its current form.
Recall that Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong called the shift of crypto projects to AI a mistake.
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