Cryptocurrency mining company TeraWulf (WULF -9.54%) wasn’t mining gains for its investors at the close of the stock trading week. Its shares lost more than 9% of their value in Friday’s session, due almost entirely to a quarterly earnings report that disappointed the market. The S&P 500 (^GSPC -0.07%) did relatively well that day, closing more or less at the level where it opened in the morning.
That earnings release was the first covering TeraWulf’s 2025 performance, and hopefully for its shareholders, it won’t be indicative of the rest of the year. Revenue fell to $34.4 million for the period from first quarter 2024’s $42.4 million, as the number of its chosen crypto — Bitcoin — it mined fell to 372 from the year-ago tally of 1,051.
Net loss deepened significantly, coming in at over $61 million ($0.16 per share) against the previous first quarter’s less than $15 million.
Exacerbating those dynamics, TeraWulf didn’t come close to meeting analyst estimates for key fundamentals. Pundits following the crypto miner’s stock assumed the company would earn slightly more than $46 million on the top line, and book an adjusted net loss of merely $0.04 per share.
Understandably, TeraWulf management elected to look on the bright side in the earnings report. It quoted CFO Patrick Fleury as saying, “With $219.6 million in cash and Bitcoin holdings at quarter-end, we are well-capitalized to fund our near-term growth.”
That was cold comfort to investors, who seemed to be caught off-guard by the deterioration in those leading fundamentals. Recent gains in cryptocurrencies — like Bitcoin, as it happens — aren’t going to help miners like TeraWulf either. Crypto-curious investors these days are instead probably better off investing directly in coins or tokens, or in a spot crypto exchange-traded fund (ETF).
