Canaan’s Q3 revenue drops 90% to $14.5 million as hardware sales collapse

Canaan Inc. sold Bitcoin mining machines for a living. Last quarter, it mostly mined Bitcoin instead.

The Singapore-based company, listed on Nasdaq under the ticker CAN, reported total revenue of $14.5 million for the third quarter of 2026. That is a 90% drop from the $150.5 million it booked in the same quarter a year earlier.

The culprit is the part of the business that gave Canaan its identity. Hardware sales came in at just $4.8 million, as weaker demand and fierce price competition squeezed the mining equipment market.

The numbers behind the slide

Canaan released its unaudited third-quarter results on November 10. Revenue fell 54% from the $31.9 million the company posted in the second quarter of 2026.

The revenue mix tells the real story. Product sales contributed $4.8 million, while mining operations brought in $9.5 million.

Management did not sound surprised. The company said the result landed close to its earlier guidance range of $11 million to $15 million.

CEO Nangeng Zhang was direct about the source of the pain.

“Continued weakness in bitcoin mining equipment demand.”

A profit, with an asterisk

Despite revenue cratering, Canaan reported GAAP net income of $8.0 million, or $0.01 per share.

That reverses a hefty second-quarter loss of $97.6 million.

The profit came largely from gains on the company’s Bitcoin holdings and financial derivatives, not from selling more machines.

Non-GAAP adjusted EBITDA reached $22.4 million for the quarter.

As of September 30, 2026, Canaan held 1,875 BTC in its treasury. It mined 133 BTC during the third quarter.

Buybacks and a bet on power

Canaan also announced a new $20 million share repurchase program.

The other development is in energy infrastructure. Canaan said it secured a conditional classification from ERCOT, the operator of the Texas power grid, for a 1 GW power project in the state.

What this means for Canaan and the mining sector

The CEO’s comment about continued weakness in equipment demand suggests the problem is industry-wide, not a Canaan-specific stumble.

For investors, the earnings quality question is the one to watch. A company profitable mostly because of Bitcoin and derivative gains carries a different risk profile than one profitable from operations.

If Bitcoin falls, those same holdings could drag results back into the red. The $97.6 million second-quarter loss is a recent reminder of how quickly that swing can happen.