The9 to enter mining industry as shares jump 140%

Nasdaq-listed The9 Ltd announced entry into the cryptocurrency mining industry. Within two days of the announcement, the Chinese internet company’s shares jumped 140%.

The chart below shows NCTY rising from around $3.50 to $8.56 amid a surge in trading volumes.

Data: Yahoo Finance.

On the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission site, The9 Ltd signed an agreement with several former directors of the mining hardware maker Canaan. The9 will issue Class A shares and warrants to them in exchange for helping to build the mining business, including the development of specialized hardware.

Through the issuance of securities, the company intends to raise $34 million, creating NBTC Limited as a dedicated division for the new venture.

“Our goal is to create mining devices for The9 that will generate 8% to 10% of the global Bitcoin hash rate, 10% — Ethereum and 10% — Grin,” said The9 CEO Jun Zhu.

Notably, shortly before the announcement The9 received a notification that its capitalization was insufficient for Nasdaq listing—the threshold is $35 million.

The9 Ltd was founded in 1999. It develops its own online games and distributes titles from other well-known developers in China. Previously The9 Ltd was the exclusive distributor in China of World of Warcraft, published by Blizzard.

Since 2004 The9 Ltd has traded on Nasdaq. In 2018 the company diversified into blockchain projects. Specifically, The9 entities signed agreements with Gingkoo Technology and C&I Singapore Renewable and Innovative to develop projects based on distributed ledger technology, including renewable energy.

The9 Ltd was the first investor in the blockchain Telegram (TON) project during the 2018 closed token offering (ICO). It purchased 5,297,257 tokens for $2 million. Subsequently the TON project closed amid SEC issues and returned $1.2 billion to investors.

ForkLog reported on the surge in the shares of mining companies Riot Blockchain, Marathon Patent Group and Canaan as Bitcoin’s price rose.

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