▲ Bitcoin (BTC), cryptocurrency mining / ChatGPT-generated image

MARA Holdings, the world’s largest Bitcoin mining company, has been thrust into a harsh reassessment of its corporate value as it faces deteriorating mining profitability and massive losses, prompting a veteran Wall Street analyst to slash his price target by 44%.

On March 6 (local time), Brian Dobson, Managing Director of Emerging Technology at Clear Street, lowered his price target for MARA Holdings (MARA) from $16 to $9 while maintaining a Hold rating in a report. Dobson, a veteran analyst with more than 20 years of experience, cited the company’s recent fourth-quarter results, which fell well short of market expectations, as the primary reason for the downgrade. He pointed to rising Bitcoin (BTC) mining difficulty and increasing energy costs as key factors eroding profitability in the mining segment.

According to MARA Holdings’ fourth-quarter 2025 results, the company posted revenue of $202 million but reported a net loss of $1.71 billion, shocking the market. Earnings per share (EPS) came in at -$4.52, missing estimates, while a $1.5 billion book loss from fair value adjustments on its Bitcoin holdings significantly weighed on results. Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization (EBITDA) also swung to a loss of $1.48 million from a profit of $796 million a year earlier, reflecting a broad deterioration in financial metrics.

In valuing MARA Holdings, Dobson applied a sum-of-the-parts approach, separately assessing the Bitcoin mining and high-performance computing (HPC) segments. He slashed his 2027 EBITDA forecast for the company by more than 80%, from $571 million to $99 million. As a result, he assigned a value of $2 per share to the mining segment, while valuing the AI-linked HPC partnership business at $7 per share, arriving at a final price target of $9.

Amid the crisis, MARA Holdings is attempting a major transformation beyond a pure mining company into an energy-intensive digital infrastructure platform. CEO Fred Thiel declared, “MARA Holdings is no longer simply a Bitcoin mining company,” signaling a strategic focus on expanding AI data centers and energy infrastructure. The company also disclosed in a recent filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission that it may abandon its long-held HODL strategy and sell Bitcoin to secure liquidity and respond to market stress.

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