New York, Jan 17, 2026, 07:03 EST — The market has closed.
- RIOT jumped roughly 16% on Friday after revealing its first third-party data center lease with AMD and securing the land beneath its Rockdale, Texas facility.
- Riot said the 10-year agreement kicks off with 25 megawatts of “critical IT load” and has the potential to grow to 200 megawatts.
- U.S. markets remain closed Monday in observance of Martin Luther King Jr. Day; trading resumes Tuesday.
Riot Platforms shares surged Friday after the bitcoin miner announced it signed its first data center lease with Advanced Micro Devices and purchased the land beneath its Rockdale, Texas facility. The stock closed at $19.24, rising roughly 16% on heavy volume.
This move is significant because Riot aims to repurpose its energy-intensive bitcoin mining sites into data centers geared for high-performance computing — the kind of capacity AI workloads demand — rather than relying solely on crypto cycles. Investors will get their first real glimpse of this pivot when U.S. markets reopen next week after the holiday.
Riot disclosed it spent $96.0 million to acquire 200 acres in Milam County, Texas, financing the purchase by selling roughly 1,080 bitcoin from its holdings. The company added that the AMD lease spans 10 years and is projected to bring in about $311 million in contract revenue. With three additional five-year extension options, total contract revenue could reach around $1.0 billion.
Riot will supply AMD with 25 megawatts (MW) of “critical IT load” capacity in stages starting January 2026, wrapping up by May. AMD also has options to boost its leased capacity at Rockdale up to 200 MW. Riot CEO Jason Les described the deal as “a validation” of their infrastructure, while AMD CIO Hasmukh Ranjan emphasized the need for partners who can “match our pace and scale.” Riot Platforms
Fee simple means outright ownership in real estate terms — Riot is swapping a ground lease for full ownership of the land itself. “Critical IT load” measures the actual usable power a data center can supply to its servers, not just the capacity listed at the grid connection.
Riot’s shares climbed alongside other U.S.-listed crypto miners heading into the weekend. Marathon Digital finished at $11.36, gaining roughly 6.6%, and CleanSpark wrapped at $13.37, up around 5.0%. Meanwhile, bitcoin hovered near $95,000.
Riot plans to kick off the deployment using the current Rockdale setup, with retrofit costs hitting around $89.8 million—about $3.6 million per MW. The company expects this to generate roughly $25 million in net operating income annually. The lease also comes with yearly escalators.
Analyst desks were swift to react. Cantor Fitzgerald bumped Riot’s price target to $31 from $25, maintaining an Overweight rating. They pointed to the AMD lease and potential for additional capacity options as the buildout progresses.
Still, investors are betting on the timeline. Any hold-ups in retrofitting, a jump in build costs, or weaker customer demand might cut into the upside. AMD’s expansion rights remain options, not guarantees. Riot also offloaded bitcoin to finance the land purchase, shrinking its crypto reserves and adding a layer of execution risk to the story.
U.S. equities were closed Monday for Martin Luther King Jr. Day, so all eyes turn to Tuesday’s open to see if RIOT can maintain its Friday surge. Investors will also be looking for news on the initial phase of capacity delivery expected later this month, along with updates on the target to wrap up by May.
