Ionic Digital, the bitcoin miner spun out of Celsius Network’s bankruptcy, closed its first trading session at $62.90, a 26% jump from its $50 open and 19% above the Nasdaq reference price of $53. The direct listing, the exchange’s largest since 2021, values the company at roughly $2.8 billion on 44.9 million shares outstanding and hands Celsius claimholders a liquid exit they have waited more than two years to see.
The bankruptcy provenance
Ionic was created in January 2024 to acquire Celsius’ mining assets under the lender’s court-approved reorganization. It issued 37 million Class A shares to eligible holders of certain claims against Celsius and its affiliates, meaning the float is almost entirely owned by creditors who received stock instead of cash. No new shares were sold in the listing and the company received no proceeds, a pure liquidity event for a creditor base that has been locked in since Celsius froze withdrawals in June 2022.
The pivot and the lease
The miner has already abandoned its original business. Ionic decommissioned bitcoin mining at its Ward County, Texas site in December and committed the full 234 megawatts of capacity to Nscale under a 126-month lease carrying $1.95 billion in contracted revenue. Management projects as much as $195 million in revenue this year, with more than 90% coming from infrastructure leasing rather than hash rate. The balance sheet shows 2,815.6 bitcoin worth $192.1 million and zero debt as of March 31.
The private money and the lock-up
A $400 million private placement of convertible preferred shares and warrants at $53 each closed in June, converting into common stock at listing. Those investors agreed not to transfer securities below $70 until six months after the debut, a floor that sits 11% above Tuesday’s close. The reference price implied a $2.4 billion valuation per Renaissance Capital; the close pushes that to $2.8 billion, a premium that assumes the AI pivot executes on schedule and the Nscale lease holds.
What to watch
The lock-up expiry in six months will test whether the $70 floor was a genuine conviction marker or a negotiating tactic. Meanwhile, the market is pricing a data-center landlord more than a bitcoin miner, a bet that 234 megawatts in West Texas is worth more serving GPUs than ASICs. If Nscale performs, the $1.95 billion contract makes the math work. If it doesn’t, the creditors who just got liquidity may find they swapped one illiquid claim for another.