Bitfarms Rebrands to Keel Infrastructure, Shifts to U.S. and AI Compute as Shares Jump

Bitfarms is recoding its business around compute, not coins. The publicly traded miner plans to abandon Bitcoin mining, rebrand as Keel Infrastructure, and move its corporate domicile to the United States to build and own high-performance computing (HPC) and AI data centers across North America. The stock responded immediately—BITF rose roughly 27% Friday to about $2.17 amid a broader bounce in crypto equities and tokens.

The company first flagged this break from Bitcoin mining in November during a strategic review. On Friday, management said the board approved the U.S. redomiciliation and the new name, framing the “keel” as the unseen backbone of a vessel—an analogy for foundational, utility-like infrastructure. Leadership emphasized that the business will operate as an infrastructure-first owner and developer supporting AI and HPC customers, positioning itself to deliver the “compute of the future.”

A special shareholder meeting is scheduled for March 20 to approve the plan. If cleared, Bitfarms expects to complete the move by April 1 and begin trading on the Nasdaq under the ticker KEEL.

What matters here isn’t the branding; it’s the power strategy. Bitcoin miners control cheap energy, hardened facilities, and cooling—scarce ingredients in the AI buildout. Pivoting that footprint from fixed-function ASIC mining to flexible, revenue-diverse compute tenants turns power into a yield product rather than a directional bet on BTC’s block economics. If Bitfarms executes, it trades hash price volatility for contracted or quasi-contracted AI workloads, which can deliver steadier cash flows even when Bitcoin ranges.

Technically, this isn’t a trivial refit. AI data centers demand different electrical and thermal profiles (high-density racks, liquid or advanced air cooling, and robust interconnects) plus scarce semiconductors. Sourcing GPUs at scale, securing fiber, and meeting utility interconnection timelines are the gating items—not just building shells. The company’s existing sites give it a head start on power and land, but the capex curve steepens, and timelines extend versus plugging in miners.

From a market psychology perspective, investors often reward credible energy-to-compute transitions because the revenue model appears more predictable, especially when crypto prices slide. That backdrop matters: Bitcoin fell to about $60,255 on Thursday before rebounding near $70,415; it is down roughly 16% on the week and more than 44% below its $126,080 peak. The pop in BITF likely reflects both the plan’s narrative and Friday’s rebound in crypto-linked assets.

Competitively, Bitfarms isn’t moving alone. Riot Platforms, MARA Holdings, and CleanSpark have all outlined varying degrees of AI exposure. Cipher Mining and Hut 8 went further, inking multibillion-dollar arrangements with Google to support AI data centers. That tells you the bottleneck is power and permitting, not demand; hyperscalers and foundation model players are willing to prepay to secure capacity. For Bitfarms/Keel, the business question becomes whether it can lock tier-1 tenants on multi‑year terms while managing supply chain risk on GPUs and cooling.

There’s also an ethical dimension that sophisticated allocators increasingly weigh: allocating megawatts between decentralized monetary infrastructure and centralized AI stacks. Some stakeholders will argue that redeploying energy to AI improves productivity and social utility; others will see it as walking away from Bitcoin’s credibly neutral settlement layer. Framed commercially, the choice is about return on megawatt-hour and resilience of demand. In tight power markets, firms will follow the higher lifetime value per kilowatt, and AI currently prices that premium.

Execution is the variable. Success hinges on converting mining sites into dense compute zones, securing chip supply and network, and underwriting tenant credit without surrendering too much upside in long-term contracts. If Bitfarms manages those trade-offs, the rebrand to Keel Infrastructure could shift the company from a cyclical miner to a power-backed compute landlord with optionality as AI workflows evolve.

For now, the market is giving the pivot the benefit of the doubt. The real test starts after the March 20 vote—and whether KEEL is live on Nasdaq by April 1 with signed AI workloads to match the new name.