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It thus offers itself 15,000 more Antminers from the manufacturer Bitmain. The result: a 65% increase in its Bitcoin hash rate (BTC).
The soaring value of Bitcoin gives wings to the mining industry. Riot Blockchain, a publicly-traded company, has announced a significant order for additional miners. It acquires no less than 15,000 Antminers from Bitmain.
These ASIC machines designed for crypto mining cost the company a total of $35 million. They also bring to 31,000 the total number of equipment acquired in 2020 by Riot Blockchain for its activities.
The firm’s latest order includes the purchase of 3,000 S19 Pro Antminers. In addition, 12,000 units of Bitmain’s S19j Pro Antminers were also purchased. However, Riot Blockchain is not expected to take advantage of this computing power for many months to come.
The delivery and deployment of future mining machines will be progressive. They will begin in May 2021 and will run until next October. Once in production, the miners will significantly increase Riot’s power.
The company expects to increase its Bitcoin hash rate by 65%. In 2021, this indicator will rise to 3.8 exahashes per second (EH/s), compared to the current capacity of 2.3 EH/s. This target is based on the commissioning of 31,000 miners.
Energy consumption will also increase. These new appliances will represent a total energy expenditure of 120 megawatts. But for Riot Blockchain, increasing mining capacity is a business imperative.
Continued growth in the number of miners is “critical to a miner’s success,” says CEO Jeff McGonegal. “It is very significant to increase the hash rate of Bitcoin mining and to operate on a profitable basis,” he continues.
But this increase in mining capacity is even more critical during periods when the spot price of Bitcoin has risen significantly. This is a particularly good time for these companies.
Bitcoin is performing like no other. Since March, its lowest level of the year, the value of crypto has jumped by 474%. And over one year, the increase is 214%.