Key Takeaways:
- In April, public miners liquidated more bitcoin than they generated, with a sell-off ratio exceeding any since 2022.
- CleanSpark, IREN, and Cango increased their hash rates as the terms for ASIC deals turn more favorable for miners.
- Despite bitcoin reaching a new all-time high of $109,000, hash prices remain under pressure, currently at $55 per petahash per second (PH/s).
Bitcoin BTC reached a new all-time high of $109,000 on Wednesday, yet this serves as little comfort for miners. Last month, they were compelled to liquidate a record proportion of their BTC holdings. According to a research report from TheMinerMag, public miners sold 115% of their bitcoin production in April, the highest rate recorded since late 2022.
Even with the surge to a new record price, miners are facing a challenging environment. Hash price, indicative of earnings per computational unit of power, remains depressed, currently at $55/PH/s, significantly lower than the $63/PH/s peak seen during the last time bitcoin passed the $100,000 mark in December. Increased network difficulty and low transaction fees contribute to ongoing revenue struggles.
Many top players in the mining sector continue to expand operations. CleanSpark has surpassed 40 EH/s in hash rate, while IREN, which recently overtook Riot Platforms to become the third largest public miner in hash rate terms, is projecting a 50 EH/s total by June. Cango is aiming for an additional 18 EH/s by July.
MARA Holdings maintains the highest installed hash rate at 57.3 EH/s. Recently, a shift has occurred regarding how miners acquire new equipment. Several public firms have negotiated contracts with Bitmain that allow them to pay for mining machines using bitcoin while retaining the option to repurchase their assets at a pre-set price.
Despite a challenging first quarter for mining stocks, many experienced a recovery, some rising over 60% in April alone. However, several remain in the negative for the year, with only CleanSpark and MARA Holdings currently seeing positive gains.
