Riot buys BTC miners from MicroBit for $290M
Riot has announced that it has acquired the largest hashrate with an 18 EH/s offering from Microbit. 66,560 latest generation M66S model BTC miners cost $290.5 million. Riot's stock price rose following the news, trading above $15 on Monday, December 4th.
Bitcoin mining company Riot Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ: RIOT ), has announced the purchase of over 66k miners from Bitcoin mining hardware manufacturer MicroBit.
The purchase is in addition to the 33,280 miners Riot acquired in an earlier deal. It's the company's biggest yet, Riot CEO Jason Les said in a press release.
Riot bought 18 EH/s miners from Microbit
According to the miner, the new order is for 66,560 microbit M66S models, the recently announced miner with an efficiency of 18.5 Joules per terabyte. The total cost to miners will be $290.5 million, with an average price of approximately $16 per TH.
Riot also said it has renewed its long-term purchase agreement with MicroBit, which gives the miner the option to acquire up to 265,000 additional miners. These purchases carry the same terms as the newly announced order.
“The value of these future purchase options as announced today will not exceed our current order, which will allow Riot to more effectively plan future capital requirements and protect against high market prices for future miners,” Les pointed out.
The deployment of 33,280 MicroBit miners will take place during the first quarter of 2024, with deliveries to the specified group starting in the second half of next year. Riot expects the two orders to be fully delivered in the second half of 2025, surpassing the company's total self-mining hash rate of 38EH/s.
If Riot completes future purchases, it will earn an additional 75 EH/s and its auto-generation capacity will rise above 100 EH/s.
As Bitcoin rises above $40K, the price of RIOT rises.
News of Riot's strategic acquisition and expansion plans seems to have bought investors off. As of Monday afternoon, the mining company's share price was up 8 percent on the day and nearly 24 percent over the past week.
RIOT is up 345% year-to-date at $15.07. However, it reached a high above $20 in July 2023 and an all-time high above $79.50 in February 2021. While the current price is down significantly on ATH, the optimism for Bitcoin could fuel the RIOT Rally.
On Monday, the price of Bitcoin reached $42k for the first time since April 2022.
