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- 1 The acquisition will potentially double the operational hash rate of the company.
- 2 Institutional crypto miners are updating or adding machines to their existing fleet for halving.
Bitcoin (BTC) miner Marathon Digital has acquired a couple of sites to boost its mining operations. The two sites collectively provide them with an additional 390 megawatts of capacity. The acquisition has cost them $178 Million or $458,000 per megawatt and expanded the total capacity to over 900 MW after completion of the purchase.
An Effort To Reduce Production Costs
Marathon will take over the sites from subsidiaries of the financial services company Generate Capital. Additionally, it will potentially double the operational hash rate of the company. Currently, they hold a total mining capacity of 584 MW, 97 percent of which is hosted by third parties. The company hosts the remaining 3 percent.
The company CEO Fred Thiel says, “For the past year, Marathon has been vertically integrating as we transition into a more sophisticated and mature organization with a diversified portfolio of Bitcoin mining technologies and assets, and the acquisition of these sites is the next step in that evolution.”
Mining sites are based out of Texas and Nebraska. “By acquiring the sites in Granbury, Texas and Kearney, Nebraska from Generate, we have an opportunity to reduce our bitcoin production costs at these sites, to capitalize on energy hedging opportunities, and to expand our operational capacity,” added the CEO.
In November, the organization came out as the biggest public miner in context with total Bitcoin holdings. CoinGecko, a cryptocurrency ranking website, reported that they own 13,726 BTC in their portfolio. Other miners Hut 8, Riot Platforms, CleanSpark, and more did not surpass the 10K BTC mark.
The move somehow is associated with Bitcoin halving, a recurring event occurring every four years. Miners’ reward is cut in half after the event’s completion and mining difficulty is increased. It compels crypto miners to use more energy to mine BTC blocks. Currently, mining one block rewards a user with 6.25 BTC.
Institutional crypto miners are updating or adding machines to their existing fleet for halving. Recently, Cipher Mining, a BTC miner, ordered 37,396 units of Bitmain Antminer T21 miners. The biggest crypto miner in the US, Riot Platforms, updated their existing order of MicroBT miners from 33,280 to 66,560 machines.
Regarding the purchase, Riot CEO Jason Les said, “This purchase order and updated Agreement ensures that we will continue to own and operate one of the largest and most efficient Bitcoin mining fleets in the world.” The company is reportedly developing a facility in Navarro County, Texas. It will be the biggest facility if developed, given that it will hold an operational hash capacity of 1 gigawatt.
Although halving did not have an immediate impact on Bitcoin price, the asset’s value has spiked to new highs by the year’s end. Market analysts speculate the price may reach $100K following the event. Arthur Hayes, CEO of crypto exchange BitMEX believes it may reach a Million dollars in the future.
Anurag is working as a fundamental writer for The Coin Republic since 2021. He likes to exercise his curious muscles and research deep into a topic. Though he covers various aspects of the crypto industry, he is quite passionate about the Web3, NFTs, Gaming, and Metaverse, and envisions them as the future of the (digital) economy. A reader & writer at heart, he calls himself an “average guitar player” and a fun footballer.