Revenue down 94%. That’s the number that reframes everything else Intchains Group said on Aug. 20, and it’s the reason the company is no longer buying Ethereum the way it promised to six months ago.
The Nasdaq-listed altcoin mining-machine maker reported first-half revenue of RMB11.1 million, roughly $1.6 million, against RMB175.6 million a year earlier. Read the breakdown and it gets worse. Nearly all of it, RMB10.9 million, came from selling non-core chip inventory to a related party.
Strip that out and the core hardware business barely registered.
The treasury isn’t empty, so this is a choice
You might assume a company posting numbers like that is out of money. It isn’t. Intchains ended June with RMB461.1 million in cash and short-term investments, equivalent to $68 million, which it says covers the ASIC program internally and funds planned activities for at least 12 months.
So the retreat from crypto buying is a reallocation, not a fire sale. Intchains said it no longer anticipates “material additional accumulation” of cryptocurrency while it prioritizes capital for developing and commercializing its next-generation ASIC and exploring AI opportunities. The existing treasury stays put and keeps earning staking yield.
February’s plan versus August’s plan
Back in February, Intchains described a dollar-cost-averaging strategy to steadily accumulate Ethereum. In April, Chief Executive Officer Qiang Ding said the company would continue making prudent and opportunistic purchases.
Four months later, prudent and opportunistic has become no material additional accumulation. Companies rarely announce that they’ve changed their mind, but the language does it for them.
The holdings themselves are modest. Intchains held about 9,176 units of ETH-based cryptocurrencies worth RMB98.1 million as of June 30. As of Aug. 20, 4,556 ETH were allocated to staking, split between 3,556 deposited through its Goldshell platform and awaiting validator activation and 1,000 through FalconX.
Two holes in the same balance sheet
What makes the half so ugly is that the operating business and the crypto position both went wrong at once.
Cost of revenue hit RMB22.1 million, twice what the company brought in, after Intchains impaired excess mining-machine inventory against weaker demand and lower selling prices. Building machines nobody’s ordering costs money whether you sell them or not.
Then ETH fell, producing an RMB89.5 million fair-value loss, about $13.2 million. Add it up and Intchains posted an RMB148.9 million first-half net loss, roughly $21.9 million, against a RMB4.3 million profit a year earlier.
China closed a door in February
Regulators barred mining-machine manufacturers from providing sales and related services domestically, and Intchains stopped accepting new mainland orders. For a company that builds mining hardware, losing your home market isn’t a line item.
The chip that has to work
The recovery plan rests on a next-generation mining ASIC that completed tape-out in July. It still needs sample production and validation, with commercial launch targeted for the fourth quarter.
Ding said the company expects the new ASIC to contribute modestly to revenue in the second half of 2026 before becoming a more meaningful driver in 2027 as commercialization accelerates.
“It is a core part of our strategy to build a more resilient, diversified revenue base,” he said.
Ding added that Intchains expects the platform to strengthen its position in purpose-built mining hardware while improving operating efficiency for customers. Note the timeline he’s asking investors to accept: modest this year, meaningful next year.
The AI part is a sentence, not a strategy
Intchains is also evaluating AI initiatives, including potential acquisitions, as another route to longer-term growth and diversification. Ding said the effort remains in the early stages, with more specific plans expected next year.
That’s the whole disclosure. No products, no targets, no acquisition named. When a chipmaker with collapsing revenue mentions AI alongside its actual roadmap, treat the two differently.
Ethereum is up 4.87% over the past 24 hours.
Here’s the test worth watching: whether that ASIC ships in the fourth quarter as targeted. Everything else Intchains said is a plan for 2027, and the $68 million buys about 12 months of runway to get there.
