Wu said weekly mining information 0816-0823

Wu said author | Rebecca

Editor of this issue | Colin Wu

1. BlackRock ETFs hold $384 million in Bitcoin mining company shares

Documents filed by BlackRock, a $9 trillion multinational investment management company, show that the company has made significant investments in two leading publicly traded Bitcoin (BTC) mining companies. A June 30 filing with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission disclosed by Forbes shows that BlackRock owns 6.71% of Marathon Digital Holdings and 6.61% of Riot Blockchain, respectively.

In total, the investments were worth nearly $384 million, with BlackRock purchasing nearly $207 million worth of Marathon Digital Holdings stock and $176 million worth of Riot Blockchain stock. The investments are not BlackRock’s first in the digital asset space, as the firm filed with the SEC in January for two of its funds to purchase cash-settled bitcoin futures contracts, then revealed in April that its BlackRock Global Allocation Fund purchased 37 bitcoin futures contracts on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange.

2. Ankr has entered the mining industry and has deployed a 100-megawatt mining farm to explore mining machine production and mining finance

Wu said blockchain learned that Ankr announced its entry into the POW mining industry and said it has successfully landed a North American mining farm with a scale of more than 100 megabytes. Ankr said that it has reached strategic cooperation with many leading companies in the industry and successfully built mining farms in Kentucky, North Carolina, and Alberta, Canada, and more mining farms will be built in succession. At the same time, Ankr Mining is actively exploring more value-added services such as mining machine design and production, mining machine loans, and computing power finance.

In terms of time, Ankr Mining said that it has successfully achieved a quick launch in one month, that is, it takes an average of one month from the conclusion of the cooperation to the launch of the mine in North America. In terms of electricity and land use, Ankr Mining chose to directly sign a long-term cooperation electricity contract with the North American state/regional power grid, and communicate with local governments and land owners to purchase or long-term lease the land use rights near the substation. The land lease contracts are all for more than 5 years to ensure the long-term stable operation of the mine.

In addition, Ankr Mining launched its self-developed large-capacity container AnkrBox, which can accommodate 200 Ant S19 series miners, T19 series miners or Shenma miners, and 195 Avalon miners.

3. Mars hashrate token recovery and overseas operations are starting up

Wu said blockchain learned that on August 16, the Mars hashrate token supported by the CoinIn mining pool started to be launched overseas. According to the official announcement, after June 18, the power outage in Sichuan further led to a decline in the hashrate of the entire Bitcoin network. Mining operations are facing a very difficult situation. At present, the machines of the Mars Project have gradually found their footholds overseas and will be gradually launched in an orderly manner.

The article states that there are many challenges. First, there are thousands of mining machines to be migrated, and the migration destinations are relatively scattered, requiring huge initial investment. Second, the repeated global epidemic has made it difficult to ensure the timeliness of domestic and international logistics. Third, due to frequent loading and unloading, multiple transfers and long-distance transportation, the mining machines have been damaged to varying degrees (current statistics show that about 20% of the machines are damaged). In addition, the surge in mining machine maintenance and shelf-loading in the short term has greatly increased the workload of on-site operations and maintenance.

The current online BTC computing power is 39,900 TH/s, and the online ETH computing power is 252,000 MH/s. This batch of mining machines is operating normally at the new site. In addition, it is expected that in the next 2 to 3 weeks, mining machines of the same size will be delivered to each site in batches, and the online rate will double; subsequently, as the machines are restarted, the online rate will continue to rise rapidly.

Mars Computing Power Token has received investments from Three Arrows Capital, Distributed, Hashkey, IOSG and others.

4. Jiangsu Provincial High People's Court official account talks about "stealing electricity for mining"

Wu said blockchain learned that on August 19, the official WeChat public account of the Jiangsu Provincial High People's Court stated that in recent years, the hot market of virtual currencies represented by Bitcoin has attracted various "gold diggers". It is not issued by a specific monetary institution, but is generated through a large number of calculations based on a specific algorithm. This process is called "mining". "Mining" is costly, and "mining" each Bitcoin consumes 38,800 degrees of electricity. For this reason, some lawless elements have started to think of "wrong ideas".

In recent years, Hua has used a "mining machine" to mine virtual currency for profit. In January 2018, in order to reduce the electricity consumption cost of mining, Hua privately modified the electric meter and stole electricity by using more and counting less. Fearing that the theft of electricity would be exposed, Hua contacted others to remove the modified parts in September 2018. After that, the electric meter had reverse current due to inaccurate counting.

In December 2018, the power supply company sent staff to Hua's home to check because they detected a problem with the meter readings. Although it was clear that the meter was broken and needed to be replaced immediately, Hua repeatedly shirked the power supply company's request to replace the meter, and kept his computer, which had 15 USB flash drives and 6 solid-state hard drives plugged in, running all the time.

After trial, the court held that Hua's behavior constituted the crime of theft. Combining evidence such as witness testimony, expert opinions, electricity user electricity consumption information collection data, and power grid sales price list, it was further determined that the total value of Hua's stolen electricity was more than 26,050.46 yuan. Taking into account the circumstances such as his remorse, payment of arrears, and breach of contract, he was sentenced to one year and four months in prison, suspended for one year and six months, and fined 3,000 yuan.

In recent years, the value of virtual currencies represented by Bitcoin has risen sharply, attracting more and more people to invest in this industry. However, behind this "wealth code" is a large consumption of electricity resources. In addition, because Bitcoin is often used for illegal economic activities such as money laundering, my country's supervision of Bitcoin "mining" and transactions has gradually become stricter, and many places are comprehensively cleaning up and shutting down Bitcoin "mining" projects built under various names. In the face of interests, some people are willing to take risks and steal national electricity resources to reduce the cost of "mining". According to the relevant provisions of the "Power Supply Business Rules", "Electricity Law of the People's Republic of China" and "Criminal Law of the People's Republic of China", electricity thieves not only need to bear the civil liability of paying back electricity bills and breaching electricity bills, but may also be held criminally liable by judicial authorities if they constitute a crime.

5. Chengdu files a case against six people suspected of using GUCS Kylin mining machines to commit crimes

Wu Blockchain learned that on the evening of August 18, the Chengdu police released a message: Recently, the Chengdu Public Security Bureau has filed a case for investigation into Yang Moumou, Chen Moumou and others who are suspected of using the "GUCS" and "Qilin Mining Machine" virtual currencies to commit crimes. Criminal detention compulsory measures have been taken against 6 major criminal suspects, and related case investigation work is being carried out in accordance with the law.

6. Bit Digital, Inc. announces second quarter financial results for fiscal year 2021

Bit Digital, Inc., a New York-based bitcoin mining company, announced its unaudited financial results for the second quarter ended June 30, 2021 on August 20. Its second quarter 2021 financial highlights are as follows:

Bitcoin mining revenue was $28.3 million.

The amount of Bitcoin earned is 562.9.

As of June 30, 2021, 70.8% of mining equipment has been deployed, shipped to, or awaiting installation in North America.

We own 32,500 mining machines and acquired 3,515 mining machines in the second quarter of 2021.

Net loss was $1.3 million, or $0.03 per share, compared to a net loss of $0.3 million, or $0.01 per share, in the same period last year.

7. Nvidia's second-quarter revenue grew 68%, but crypto-related gains fell short of expectations

In its earnings report this week, Nvidia said revenue for the quarter was $6.5 billion, and net income nearly quadrupled to $2.37 billion from the same period last year.

In response to global card supply shortages, Nvidia announced the launch of its cryptocurrency mining processors in February, specifically targeting crypto miners.

While sales of its graphics processing units helped drive revenue, Nvidia fell short of its forecast to generate $400 million in revenue from mining-related cards during the quarter. Sales of Nvidia’s crypto mining-related products totaled $266 million, the company reported, $130 million below its forecast earlier this year.

8. Filecoin project reaches cooperation with Mask Network to jointly build Web3.0 ecosystem

On August 18, 2021, Filecoin announced a partnership with Mask Network. Users can use Filecoin to transfer files on Twitter through the Mask plug-in, and can also send encrypted files to specific Twitter friends. At the same time, Filecoin stated that it will jointly release bounty tasks related to decentralized storage with Mask Network to encourage more developers to participate in building the Web 3.0 ecosystem.

9. The 9th City plans to establish a joint venture to build a crypto mining plant in Kazakhstan

On August 20, NBTC, a subsidiary of The 9, signed an agreement with Kazakhstan’s LGHSTR. A joint venture agreement has been signed to develop cryptocurrency mining sites with a total capacity of 200 MW in Kazakhstan.

NBTC will prioritize the deployment of cryptocurrency mining machines at developed sites. Up to 100 MW of projects will be completed by the end of this year and all available a year later in 2022. Once completed, these sites can deploy more than 50,000 S19 Antminers and can accommodate approximately 5EH/s of computing power.

10. Shanghai Minhang Court: Bitcoin is virtual property and is interchangeable

Wu said blockchain learned that the Shanghai Minhang Court’s official account published a post stating that the plaintiff purchased Bitcoin “WKJ” (mining machine) from the defendant through the Internet. Later, the plaintiff believed that the central bank had issued the “Notice on Preventing the Risks of Token Issuance and Financing”, so the mining machine that generated Bitcoin was no longer valuable and the transaction was illegal. He claimed that the contract was invalid and demanded a refund. The court held that Article 127 of the Civil Code stipulates that “where the law has provisions for the protection of data and network virtual property, such provisions shall be followed”. In this case, Bitcoin does not have the monetary attributes of legal compensation and compulsion, and cannot be circulated and used as currency in the market, but it is obtained through legal labor, is disposable, interchangeable and exclusive, and has the attributes of a virtual commodity, so the sales contract is valid and the court dismissed the plaintiff’s lawsuit.

11. BitMining releases second quarter financial report

Wu Blockchain learned that Bit Mining (formerly 500.com) released its second quarter financial report, achieving a net income of approximately RMB 2.8739 billion (approximately US$445.1 million). From April 15 to June 30, BTC.com achieved revenue of approximately US$422.8 million, accounting for 95% of Bit Mining's total revenue in the second quarter.
BitMining has started Ethereum mining operations outside of mainland China. As of press time, the company's online mining machines have a theoretical computing power of 600GH/s. Based on the current Ethereum network computing power and Ethereum price of US$3,309, the company currently produces 13 Ethereum coins per day, worth approximately US$43,017. Based on the Ethereum price at press time, the company's Ethereum mining business has an electricity cost of less than 10% of its revenue. It is expected that by the end of October 2021, the company will deploy Ethereum mining machines with a total computing power of 4,800GH/s.
BitMining's layout in the Bitcoin mining business is also progressing rapidly. As of August 17, the theoretical computing power of Bitcoin mining machines held by BitMining reached 1,425.3PH/s. BitMining is steadily advancing its global mining strategy. The company has transported 7,849 Bitcoin mining machines to Kazakhstan, with a total computing power of approximately 292.7PH/s. Among them, 3,293 Bitcoin mining machines with a total computing power of approximately 121.0 PH/s have been deployed and put into operation, and the remaining 4,556 Bitcoin mining machines will also be deployed. In the second quarter of 2021, BitMining generated approximately 186 Bitcoins and confirmed revenue of approximately US$9.5 million, accounting for 2.1% of the company's total revenue in the second quarter.
As of June 30, 2021, BitMining owns cryptocurrency assets worth approximately RMB 410.8 million (approximately US$63.6 million), approximately 1,147 bitcoins, 1,083 Ethereums, 61.4 million Dogecoins and various other cryptocurrency assets, mainly from the mining pool business merged on April 15, 2021 and the cryptocurrency mining business launched at the end of February 2021.

Welcome to read Wu's selected reports: Huobi exclusive report, Binance exclusive report, Bitmain series, supervision and card freezing series, Filecoin series, currency circle chaos exposure, mining farm supervision dynamics, etc.

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