Marathon Digital Expands Bitcoin Mining with $179M Site Purchase

• Marathon Digital Plans Acquisition of Bitcoin Mining Sites
• The Acquisition and Its Benefits
• Generate Capital's Previous Acquisitions
• Preparation for Bitcoin's Halving in 2024
• Marathon's Current Market Standing

Marathon Digital Plans Acquisition of Bitcoin Mining Sites

Marathon Digital, a prominent bitcoin mining company (MARA), plans to acquire two new mining sites from subsidiaries of Generate Capital, a lending firm. The proposed acquisitions, set at a price of $178.6 million, will help to expand the firm's mining capacity by 390 megawatts. The company confirmed this development on Tuesday, stating that the payment for the acquisitions will be made in cash directly from Marathon's balance sheet.

The Acquisition and Its Benefits

The two sites under consideration for purchase exhibit varying degrees of utilization. Approximately 21% of the space is vacant and can be used for expansion. The majority of the sites, 63%, is being utilized by bitcoin mining tenants, while 16% of the total space is already under the operation of Marathon. Through these acquisitions, Marathon aims to bring down its cost per coin mined by an estimated 30%.

Generate Capital's Previous Acquisitions

In November of the previous year, Generate Capital procured stakes in two mining sites from the bankrupt miner Compute North. The deal was finalized for $5 million.

Preparation for Bitcoin's Halving in 2024

Bitcoin$42,260 -0.64%'s (BTC) expected halving in April 2024 has prompted mining firms to reevaluate their operations. The halving will result in the rewards for creating new BTC to be lessened by 50%. To cope with this change, firms are resorting to the acquisition of smaller companies to provide a greater scale to their mining operations. Earlier this month, Marathon announced that it has $800 million at its disposal for such acquisitions.

Marathon's Current Market Standing

At present, Marathon's shares listed on Nasdaq are seeing an increase of about 7% on the day, standing firm at $21.29. This is in line with the trend observed among its mining peers. Concurrently, the price of bitcoin has seen a 1.66% rise in the last 24 hours.

Edited by Jonathan Stoker