The $5.9 million purchase of Bitcoin Antminer S19J Pro miners that the company announced on November 1 came at $15.50 per terahash — significantly cheaper than the current market price of $22.94 for a similarly efficient device, according to data from Hashrate Index.
The purchase brought the total number of machines to about 50,000, according to the company.
CleanSpark said it has bought 26,500 miners since the start of “bear market conditions” – a time when many mining companies have been forced to sell mining equipment or even consider filing for bankruptcy.
There is a possibility that miners were purchased from rival Argo Blockchain as the October 31 update from Argo showed that it had sold 3,843 Bitmain S19J Pro machines, which is the exact amount and model of the miner bought by CleanSpark.
Cointelegraph has contacted CleanSpark and Argo Blockchain to confirm whether a transaction has taken place between the two companies, but there was no immediate response.
As other bitcoin miners struggle in the prevailing market conditions, CEO Zach Bradford said its “steadfast focus” on sustainability, a strong balance sheet, and its operating strategy have enabled CleanSpark to “get machines at incredible prices, increase our hash rate, and increase Our daily production of Bitcoin.”
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In a previous interview with Cointelegraph, CleanSpark CEO Matthew Schultz said that one of the strategies for running CleanSpark was to view bitcoin mining as a “potential solution to create more opportunities for energy development.”
For example, CleanSpark is partnering with various city councils in the US to purchase excess energy in order to improve the efficiency of their mining operations — but it also lowers energy costs for those communities as well, Schultz explained:
“These cities have essentially become our service provider. They make a margin on every kilowatt-hour we buy to conduct our mining operations. However, we buy such large amounts of energy that it lowers energy costs for the communities we work with.”
But as bitcoin mining becomes more difficult and profitability decreases, mining companies will need to find new ways to diversify their revenue sources in order to stay afloat, while some companies may have no choice but to merge to stay in the game.
This was the case with Crusoe Energy Systems, a Colorado-based Bitcoin miner, which bought the operating assets of mobile BTC mining operator Great American Mining (GAM).
CleanSpark also purchased a 36-megawatt facility in Washington, Georgia, in August 2022 and recently acquired an 80-megawatt facility in Sandersville, Georgia, in October 2022 to align with its two existing mining facilities.
Despite CleanSpark’s recent success, its share price fell 6.32% to $3.26 on November 1, according to Yahoo Finance. However, the decline was representative of the broader bitcoin mining sector.
