CoreWeave (NASDAQ:CRWV) is in active negotiations to acquire Core Scientific (NASDAQ:CORZ), a bitcoin mining and hosting company, according to a Wall Street Journal report.
The report, which cited people familiar with the matter, follows a previously rejected bid by CoreWeave to acquire Core Scientific for $5.75 per share, valuing the company at more than $1 billion.
The new talks could lead to a deal being finalized within the next few weeks, sources told the WSJ.
Shares of Core Scientific are up more than 40% this week on the report, trading at about $16 on Friday, while CoreWeave shares have fallen about 11% over the same period.
Core Scientific’s market capitalization is nearing $5 billion, significantly higher than the valuation implied by CoreWeave’s earlier offer.
Analysts at Wedbush believe the deal makes sense, given CoreWeave's and Core Scientific's similar backgrounds, both cryptominers that transitioned to AI datacenter operators.
“Moreover, we'd note that our discussions over the past few months have suggested that systems high end consumer graphics cards are proving efficient for token generation, perhaps suggesting Core Scientific's infrastructure could offer more substantial immediate value to CoreWeave,” the analysts wrote.