MARA's $600 Million Bitcoin Loans Add to a Larger Long Ridge Funding Test

“Non-dilutive” is MARA's description of the financing choice: it avoids issuing shares and preserves exposure to any future Bitcoin appreciation. It does not mean the treasury remains unencumbered. Both loan agreements require continuing collateral maintenance; a failure to restore the required level is an event of default that can permit a lender to liquidate pledged Bitcoin. The filing does not disclose the maintenance ratios, margin-call prices, cure periods or the allocation of collateral between the lenders. As a review of the disclosures notes, those omissions prevent calculation of a Bitcoin price that would trigger a margin call.

Company-reported June 30 bitcoin classifications. The chart does not represent the later August 4 collateral pool. Source: U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission Shareholder Letter.

The comparison with June holdings has a limit

At June 30, MARA reported 35,577 Bitcoin: 26,307 unrestricted, 4,742 loaned and 4,528 already pledged. The new 18,750-Bitcoin collateral pool equals 52.7% of that quarter-end total, but it was posted more than a month later. The figures do not reveal how much of the earlier loaned or pledged balance overlaps with the August pool, so they cannot establish the amount of unrestricted Bitcoin left after closing.

That distinction matters because MARA was already using its Bitcoin for several purposes. It said it loaned 4,742 Bitcoin and earned about $4.3 million of interest income in the quarter, and it sold 2,213 Bitcoin after mining 2,422 during the period. The company began selling mined Bitcoin to fund operations in 2025.

The broader balance sheet also remains exposed to Bitcoin values. MARA reported $174.9 million in second-quarter revenue, down 27% from a year earlier, and a $611.3 million net loss that included about $343 million of fair-value losses on digital assets. Those accounting losses are distinct from the collateral requirement, but together they show why a Bitcoin decline could affect reported results and the assets available to support borrowing.

Long Ridge needs more than the collateralized loans

Long Ridge is the asset MARA says would expand its existing Hannibal campus. Under the proposed deal, MARA would acquire the business from FTAI Infrastructure at an enterprise value of about $1.5 billion, including assumed indebtedness of up to about $900 million, subject to customary adjustments. The company says Long Ridge's power-generation capacity is currently 485 MW nameplate and is expected to reach 505 MW in the first quarter of 2027; it plans to use the site for power generation, Bitcoin mining and potential high-performance-computing infrastructure.

The $600 million loans are therefore one piece of the financing stack, not the purchase price. MARA has also obtained a commitment from Barclays for a 364-day senior secured bridge facility of up to $785 million to finance part of the transaction. That commitment is subject to customary conditions, and MARA says it cannot assure investors it will be able to draw it or find acceptable permanent financing. The company separately says it does not expect Long Ridge to need ongoing capital support after closing.

The proposed asset brings power and land, rather than a signed AI workload. MARA says in its letter to shareholders that more than 70% of Long Ridge's power output is contracted under long-term agreements and expects the acquisition to contribute positive EBITDA at closing. Those are company expectations. Its planned AI/HPC campus, by contrast, remains a development proposition.

MARA also has a February agreement with Starwood to develop, finance and operate AI and HPC projects at select power-rich sites. The arrangement is project-by-project: a special-purpose vehicle is to form when Starwood secures a qualifying tenant, and MARA may retain 10% to 50% of project equity. As of June 30, none of the sites had moved beyond pre-development, and MARA had incurred about $11 million of pre-development costs. The structure makes tenant selection, rather than simply access to a loan, a key step in turning power assets into computing revenue.

The decision still pending

MARA said Federal Energy Regulatory Commission approval of Long Ridge was still pending as of August 6. Its acquisition agreement has a November 30 outside date, potentially extendable to June 30, 2027 if specified regulatory conditions remain unresolved; certain failures to close could require a $75 million termination fee.

The company has said it is in lease discussions across its portfolio and aims to sign at least one AI or high-performance-computing lease by year-end. It has not announced a Long Ridge tenant. The next evidence that would test the strategy is therefore more specific than another financing announcement: final regulatory approval and closing, the amount actually drawn from the bridge facility or replaced with permanent financing, and a customer contract that identifies what power and computing capacity will be used.