Wall Street Keeps Buy Ratings on Crypto Firms as They Pivot to AI, Financial Infrastructure

Wall Street brokerages say crypto companies should be valued not merely as trading platforms, but increasingly as AI and financial infrastructure businesses.

The Block reported on May 19 that Benchmark, TD Cowen and Mizuho maintained buy ratings on Bitdeer, DeFi Technologies, Strive and Gemini.

The firms said the market still largely values those companies as trading-driven businesses, even as their operating models shift quickly toward AI infrastructure, capital markets and digital finance platforms.

Benchmark highlighted Bitdeer’s roughly 3 gigawatts of global power infrastructure. It said power assets in the U.S., Norway, Bhutan and Ethiopia could become increasingly valuable as demand for AI data centers rises.

In particular, Bitdeer’s Tydal facility in Norway is targeting demand for data centers built on Nvidia’s AI architecture. Lease negotiations are under way with an investment-grade company, according to the report.

DeFi Technologies also drew attention for its strategy of building its own custody infrastructure. The company views custody as core infrastructure as tokenization of real-world assets, or RWAs, and stablecoin issuance expand.

TD Cowen gave a favorable assessment of Strive’s new preferred-share structure. Strive plans to introduce a daily dividend feature, which TD Cowen said could broaden its investor base and improve the pace of its Bitcoin accumulation.

Mizuho said Gemini is expanding beyond a spot exchange into payments, credit cards, prediction markets and clearing infrastructure.

The brokerage also pointed to Gemini’s ability to keep first-quarter trading revenue largely intact even after trading volume fell by more than 50%. That signals the company is becoming less reliant on spot trading and increasing the share of structurally steadier revenue streams.

Mizuho added that Gemini is building a framework that can also adapt to the growth of AI-driven automated trading and API-based order flow.