Morgan Stanley’s Bitcoin Drama: 2 Winners, 1 Loser and a Dash of Irony

by

Markets & Their Pretended Rumors

What the Bunch Says

  • Morgan Stanley has thrown its hat in the ring, treating Cipher Mining and TeraWulf as if they were snow‑bound railroads, only to set Marathon Digital for a slower, crash‑landing ride.
  • The bank insists that the dusty, humming halls of Cipher’s and TeraWulf’s data‑centers deserve the same respect as a pension‑rich family estate, not a one‑night stand with Bitcoin.
  • CIFR and WULF have already sprinted ahead on Monday, raising their numbers like blinds on a city that never sleeps.

On the Monday that felt like a flat Earth announcement, Morgan Stanley wrapped itself around three companies that stake their fortunes on cryptic gold: Cipher Mining, TeraWulf, and Marathon Digital. The former two, symbols of real estate meets code, were labeled “Overweight”; the third, a miner that loves thunderstorms as much as bitcoin, was gently nudged to “Underweight”. Their price targets-38, 37, and 8 dollars respectively-play out to a theatre of hopes and nightmares.

Between 16:51 and 16:12, shareholder worries turned into applause. Cipher’s share climbed 12.4%, reaching 16.51 dollars, while TeraWulf’s tap danced up 12.8% to 16.12 dollars. Marathon Digital, barely a whisper at 8.28, showed its fingers trembling.

The crux? An analyst named Stephen Byrd told investors to stop seeing Bitcoin power centers as gambling dens and to treat them like sturdy train stations on a railroad with no sudden stops.

Once a mining plant builds a data‑center and secures a lease with a creditworthy partner, he wrote, the asset’s true finish line is not the Bitcoin whistle but the steady – – the “stable cash flow” that delights those who hate market crashes.

He echoed the tone of a poetic developer: “A data‑center, once leased in indepth agreements, is a landform for infrastructure seekers, not wanderers wishing to jump on a minute decline.”

In order to flesh out his notion, Byrd compared these mining gold‑mines to REITs like Equinix and Digital Realty. Those giants charge more than twenty dollars for each dollar of future operating cash flow because they boast breadth, growth, and an untouchable silence of scale.

“We do not expect the data-centers of Bitcoin companies to match that price, because they lack the growth potential the multi‑facility REITs offer,” the analyst said, without losing his sense of irony. He did, however, see a chance for higher valuations than the market presently bestows.

Cipher sits at the hot seat of his analysis. Byrd calls its data‑centers the “REIT endgame” because these contracted sites should ultimately be owned by investors who value long‑term, low‑risk cash flows (though we suspect they are also keen on cryptocurrency). “Imagine a Cipher site turning from Bitcoin to a lucrative toll‑road business – cash that flows gradually. Bitcoin becomes a joke.”

This same framework is applied to TeraWulf, which boasts a track record of agreements and a past in power infrastructure. Byrd projects that the firm will convert its sites at a present value of roughly eight per watt, hoping that half of the planned 250 megawatts per year beginning 2028-2032 will be realized, with higher optimism at 75% success.

The tone shifted with Marathon Digital. The entity is heavy‑armed with “lower upside possibilities for Bitcoin-to‑DC conversions.” It bonds with Bitcoin premiums, issuable convertible notes, and the dark sonnet of mining profits.

Marathon’s limited history of data‑center hosting is a damning indictment-if Robin Hood ever turned a mining pit into a data‑center, it was never.

The analyst grandly remarked that “profitability risks for Bitcoin mining abound, in the present and the future.” The headline, if no one cares, is the high ROI that overthinks forever.

Finally, the message is this: Investors are locked in a debate about whether a Bitcoin miner is a commodity or a landlord. The answer from Morgan Stanley is selective. If a “long‑term lease” is in place, space to breathe emerges. If mining remains the central tactic, the chances of extended wealth shrivel.

Read More

2026-02-09 21:37