Jefferies Initiates Coverage on IREN with Buy Rating and $79 Price Target
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Jefferies initiated coverage of AI infrastructure firm IREN with a Buy rating and a $79 price target, implying ~36% upside; the call aligns with a broad Wall Street consensus that is increasingly bullish on a former Bitcoin miner's pivot to AI cloud services.
Why does Jefferies say Buy?
The core thesis rests on IREN's ~6 GW of long-term powered land reserves — land with electricity already secured, one of the scarcest assets in the AI data-center buildout.
The other keyword is vertical integration — from power shells to full GPU cloud builds, all in-house. In plain terms = a client can get anything from a basic powered rack to a turnkey GPU cloud, all from one vendor.
Analyst Jonathan Petersen: "Owning land and data centers gives IREN a unique optionality" to serve customers across the entire stack.
What does the rest of Wall Street think?
LSEG data shows 10 out of 15 analysts covering IREN rate it Buy or Strong Buy.
Jefferies' call is consistent with — not ahead of — this consensus.
This reflects a market that has moved from "wait and see" to active endorsement of IREN's miner-to-AI-cloud transition.
Why has the stock nearly quintupled in a year?
IREN shares have surged 493% over the past 12 months, driven by contracts with hyperscalers including Microsoft and Nvidia.
Those contracts carry a combined $3.1 billion in annual recurring revenue. This means → the revenue is not one-off; it is locked-in, recurring cash flow.
In plain terms = big-name, long-duration contracts gave the market confidence to reprice the stock at multiples of its prior level.
Who is IREN competing against?
Jefferies sees IREN's expanding portfolio of high-power contracts positioning it as a credible rival to CoreWeave (CRWV) and Nebius (NBIS).
IREN was previously a Bitcoin mining company; Jefferies calls its shift to a vertically integrated AI cloud provider "a compelling strategic pivot."
This signals a broader pattern: miners with power and land assets are being re-rated as AI compute players in this cycle.
Content is for reference only, not financial advice.