Bitcoin Friday — Aug. 30, 2024

Here are my quick, candid thoughts on bitcoin heading into the weekend.

Happy Bitcoin Friday!

In February, I talked about “the Great Hash Race” ahead of the bitcoin halving in April. The bitcoin mining landscape got drastically more competitive the last four years and it’s become even more competitive since the most recent bitcoin halving on April 19, 2024. Bitcoin miners dedicate computing power to the bitcoin network to both help secure it and process transactions. They’re rewarded with newly released bitcoin if their hashing power is the one that processes a given transaction block.

Bitcoin mining is cutthroat.

Miners constantly need more efficient machines to remain competitive. They also need cheap, efficient, and reliable energy sources and overall operating infrastructure. As we’re nearing six months post-halving, we’re starting to see who is surviving and thriving in the mining landscape.

Several smaller, private operations have been bought by larger publicly-traded and private companies. Some mining companies have established operations in both the US and overseas and many are diversifying their business and revenue streams to also support artificial intelligence and other high performance computing (HPC) businesses by acting as a data center for their clients.

I own Bit Digital and IREN.

Both are publicly-traded mining companies who have gotten involved in AI and other HPC work with businesses that run gaming and streaming services. Bit Digital added $12.5 million in revenue via a new partnership with an HPC client in the second quarter of this year.