IREN Jumps 23% as Its AI Business Starts to Take Over the Story

This article first appeared on GuruFocus. IREN Ltd. (IREN, Financials) was a simple corporation to describe. It dug Bitcoin. Now investors are beginning to think about something else. IREN shares have soared roughly 23% in the last five days as Wall Street has paid more attention to the company's fast-growing AI cloud division. The figures explain the excitement. AI cloud sales climbed to $128.8 million in fiscal 2026 from $16.4 million a year ago. That represents a rise of over 700%. The rest of the quarter was, well, not so impressive. Revenue declined 27 percent from a year earlier to $137.2 million, and the business reported an adjusted loss of 41 cents a share. But both numbers were better than analysts had predicted. That was enough to push AI back into the spotlight. Iren controls a lot of electrical infrastructure, which has suddenly become quite valuable as corporations scramble for electricity and data-center capacity for AI. Bernstein has alluded to the company's aspirations to grow toward about 2 gigawatts of electricity capacity by 2029. That leaves IREN with an interesting second phase. Bitcoin mining has helped construct the infrastructure. Eventually, AI could be the business that matters most to investors. Next test is if AI cloud revenue can increase quickly enough to justify stock's recent rally.