It is predicted that Marathon Digital’s objective to quadruple its Bitcoin mining capacity by 2024 will significantly upset the cryptocurrency mining industry. The company aims to achieve 50 exahashes per second (EH/s) by 2024, following acquisitions that greatly increased its operational capacity. This represents a notable increase over the 35–37 EH/s that came before.
In a news release on April 25, Marathon CEO Fred Thiel expressed his belief that the company can achieve this difficult objective. He said the company is well-positioned to grow its mining operations by 2024 because of the extra capacity from recent acquisitions. Thiel also assured stakeholders that the new objective would be “fully funded,” negating the need for additional fundraising efforts.
Bitcoin Mining Expansion Recent Acquisitions and Performance
Its two most recent acquisitions were a 200-megawatt Bitcoin mining plant from Digital Applied in March that cost $87.3 million and two additional sites with a combined capacity of 390 megawatts that it bought from Generate Capital in December for $179 million. Marathon performs better than Core Scientific and Riot Platforms, achieving hash rates of 24.7 EH/s compared to 16.9 EH/s and 12.4 EH/s, respectively, according to the Hashrate Index.
If Marathon achieves its 50 EH/s goal, its market value will increase by more than 100% from the beginning of 2024. Marathon’s (MARA) stock, which lost just 0.42% during the day on April 25, increased 3.05% after hours on April 25, indicating investor interest in this bold development approach.
Since April 20 at block 840,000, when the fourth Bitcoin halving event occurred, Marathon’s shares have increased by over 15%. This growth is consistent with a larger trend in the mining of cryptocurrencies. Despite the surge in demand caused partly by supporters of meme currencies and nonfungible tokens competing for “rare satoshis” via the Runes protocol, transaction costs declined to $28.20 by April 24, according to YCharts.
The Bitcoin mining industry has more players than only Marathon. Riot Platforms’ rapid expansion has also caused substantial changes in the market for other major firms. On April 23, Riot’s shares shot up more than 20% due to bullish analyst projections that the company’s financial situation would greatly improve.
Future innovations and disruptions in the Bitcoin ecosystem are expected as Marathon and its rivals expand their operations and push the limits of Bitcoin mining power.
