Mining vs AI: What’s wrong with this picture?

MINING.COM’s old icon. Not AI-generated.

As the saying from mid-19th century California goes, during a gold rush the easiest way to get rich is selling shovels and picks. 

Never has this old business school adage been truer than for NVIDIA. The California-based company’s market worth has skyrocketed as companies rush to buy its graphics processors to power artificial intelligence projects. 

Nevertheless, it’s jarring to see the companies doing the actual shovelling be appraised by the market in such a contrasting way.

The MINING.COM ranking of the 50 most valuable mining companies shows a combined value of $1.4 trillion at the end of the second quarter, not even half that of NVIDIA.    

There is another maxim from the mining industry: If it can’t be grown it has to be mined. 

Looking at this chart, that’s clearly not something often mentioned in investment circles.

Mining vs AI: What’s wrong with this picture?

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