Riot Blockchain slashes quarterly loss tenfold

In the third quarter, the mining company Riot Blockchain posted a net loss of $36.6 million versus $366.3 million in the prior period.

Riot Reports Third Quarter 2022, Current Operational and Financial Highlights.

Read Riot’s latest press release here: https://t.co/xVQmafjDZt

— Riot Blockchain Inc. (@RiotBlockchain) November 7, 2022

In Riot Blockchain’s second-quarter results, impairment of goodwill (by $349.1 million) and Bitcoin reserves (by $99.8 million) weighed heavily.

Compared with July–September 2021, Riot Blockchain’s loss for the period rose by 16%. Year-over-year revenue declined by 28% to $46.3 million.

Mining generated $22.1 million for the quarter, hosting services $8.4 million. Revenue from the electrical-equipment manufacturer ESS Metron, acquired in 2021, amounted to $15.8 million.

During the quarter, Riot Blockchain generated $13.1 million from feeding electricity back into the grid, versus $5.7 million in Q2. The amount is equivalent to mining roughly 760 BTC for the period, the company said.

Riot Blockchain mined 1,042 BTC in the third quarter, compared with 1,292 BTC a year earlier.

As of September 30, the company operated a fleet of 55,728 ASIC miners with a total hashrate of 5.6 EH/s.

In October the firm deployed an additional 9,788 Antminer S19 devices from Bitmain. A further 7,912 units are awaiting hookup. After the installation is complete, Riot Blockchain’s capacity is expected to total about 7.8 EH/s.

By early 2023, the company is aiming to grow its fleet to 115,450 miners with a hashrate of about 12.5 EH/s. Virtually all of Riot Blockchain’s equipment will consist of S19-series miners.

The company said it continues expanding the data centre in Rockdale with a capacity of 400 MW, and has begun laying the foundation for a 1 GW facility in Corsicana. Both projects are in Texas.

Riot Blockchain said the company remained in a solid financial position. As of the end of the third quarter, it had $255 million in cash and 6,766 BTC on its balance sheet. The total value of reserves stood at $369.8 million.

Earlier in September, the industry faced its first major bankruptcy — blockchain hosting provider Compute North filed for insolvency.

In October, Core Scientific warned regulators about the risk of reserve depletion by year-end and the potential default on financial obligations.

Argo Blockchain said it would restrict or even halt cryptocurrency mining operations without additional capital.

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