Bitcoin Mining Company Riot Blockchain Now Joins 6,978 BTC

The leading Bitcoin mining company, Riot Blockchain. (Photo; Doc. CoinCentral)

JAKARTA - Riot Blockchain, a US-based cryptocurrency mining company, has 6.978 BTC after breaking records last month. Riot generated 740 BTC last month, an increase of 62 percent from January 2022 and a record high monthly for the company. This is opposite to the disappointing production and revenue rate at the end of 2022.

Despite having problems with its mining fleet, Riot managed to break records in terms of the number of bitcoins generated in January with 740 BTC. CEO Jason Les explained that Rockdale facilities were damaged by a recent winter storm in Texas affecting the hash rate capacity.

"Repairs are ongoing in both buildings, and we have managed to get Building F back online, representing 0.6 EH/s of the affected hash rate capacity. We are grateful for the progress of our team, despite the difficult weather conditions, and are currently evaluating several options to bring online about 1.9 EH/s hash rate capacity which is still affected at Building G," Riot Blockchain CEO.

Extreme weather may be an obstacle for Riot in achieving the target hash rate capacity of 12.5 EH/s in the first quarter of 2023. Riot took advantage of a jump in bitcoin prices to sell 700 BTC for 13.7 million (approximately IDR 200 billion) US dollars. Currently Riot has 6,978 BTC worth more than 160 million US dollars (equivalent to IDR 2.4 trillion).

The fleet consists of 82,656 miners with a hash rate of 9.3 EH/s. The snowstorm forced more than 17,000 engines to shut down. However, Riot has good news by announcing his team's expansion with new members, in contrast to the dismissal that occurred in this sector.

Many big players such as Coinbase, Bybit, Kraken, and Gemini are currently dismissing employees. Riot's rival, Core Scientific, also reduced the number of employees, but that was not enough to prevent filing for bankruptcy protection days before Christmas.

Last year, Riot experienced a fall that began in July when it only mined 318 BTC, 28 percent less than the previous month. The main factor in the decline was the very hot weather in Texas which made the temperature rise above 40 degrees Celsius.

Many miners, including Riot, had to temporarily halt their activities to prevent severe problems in local power grids and the risk of power outages.