NEW YORK, June 24, 2026, 14:03 (EDT)
- MARA dropped almost 8% as shares of bitcoin and other crypto miners moved lower.
- Shareholders signed off on an 18 million-share boost to the 2018 equity incentive plan.
- Citizens started coverage with a market outperform rating and set a $24 price target, according to Benzinga data.
MARA Holdings shares dropped almost 8% to $13.54 by midday Wednesday as bitcoin slipped and crypto miners traded lower. At last check, bitcoin was off 4.9% at $59,328. Riot Platforms gave up 5.5% and CleanSpark was down 7.1%.
MARA filed a current report June 22 after its annual meeting. Shareholders cleared an amendment to the 2018 equity incentive plan, adding 18 million shares to the stock pool for employee and director pay.
The company is reserving 81 million shares under the plan, an amended total disclosed in an exhibit to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
SEC filings from June 22 show Marathon Digital CEO Fred Thiel sold 27,505 shares at $14.25 each on June 17 through a Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. General Counsel Zabi Nowaid moved 7,000 shares at the same price. CFO Salman Hassan Khan also sold, offloading 16,000 shares at $14.25 using a preset plan.
Director Douglas Mellinger filed a Form 144 the same day, disclosing plans to sell 7,000 shares worth $112,000 in aggregate market value. The Form 144 is just a notice of intended sale, not confirmation that shares were sold.
MARA shares stayed down even with a new positive call from Citizens. The firm began coverage with a market outperform and set a $24 target on June 24, Benzinga reported. Benzinga lists the consensus on the name as neutral with a $17.49 average price target.
MARA still trades like a bitcoin proxy, but management is working to pivot the narrative to power and data. In April, the company said it would acquire Long Ridge Energy & Power from FTAI Infrastructure for $1.5 billion, including debt, which gets it a 505-megawatt gas plant in Ohio and space for building out a data center campus. “It has all the key components for us,” CEO Thiel said in an interview with Reuters, calling the site “the ideal data center campus.” Reuters
MARA’s Q1 numbers put focus on bitcoin’s impact. Revenue dropped 18% to $174.6 million. Net loss ballooned to $1.3 billion, with $1.0 billion of that linked to fair value losses on digital assets. The company held 35,303 bitcoin at the end of March, produced 2,247 bitcoin during the period, and sold 20,880 bitcoin for an average of $70,137 each.
The downside is straightforward. If bitcoin falls further, MARA’s holdings take a hit and mining margins could shrink. Slower lease-ups at AI data centers would keep the stock more linked to bitcoin than to management’s infrastructure pitch. The new share pool means dilution risk sticks around if stock comp goes up.
