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What's a shovel?

They're using the analogy of mining for gold. the cost of a shovel/pitchfork goes up when the price of gold goes down - which is a double whammy

you didn't answer the question. A shovel in this case is the equipment + energy needed to mine (GPU's etc.)

Which is pretty much obvious to anyone who has heard of bitcoin in the year of our lord 2026

Especially since the "sell shovels during a gold rush" has been used to apply to nVidia

But the person upstream hasn’t. It’s not obvious to them. Which is why a good answer has to include the detail.