It was no secret that miners would see their BTC production numbers decline in the first full month after the Bitcoin halving.
After all, that is the reality of the event that occurred on April 19. Per-block mining rewards were systematically slashed from 6.25 BTC to 3.125 BTC.
But some companies saw bigger drops in BTC production than others, with one in particular appearing to win the month (in this category, at least).
Bitcoin mining giant Marathon Digital mined 616 BTC in May, leading its biggest publicly traded competitors.
The company actually saw a 32% month-over-month increase in the number of blocks won, CEO Fred Thiel said in a statement. This meant Marathon’s May BTC production declined just 27% — from 850 BTC in April.
Others saw more substantial decreases in the 40-plus percent range.
Core Scientific had a month-over-month drop of 44% — from 803 BTC in April to 447 BTC in May.
The company — like other miners — has signaled its future focus on supporting high-performance computing (HPC) services to help combat the lower mining rewards.
Core Scientific is dedicating 200 megawatts (MW) of infrastructure to that cause via a 12-year deal with CoreWeave, a cloud provider that then proposed to buy the bitcoin miner. Core Scientific rejected that bid.
Core Scientific is seeking out other clients for an additional 300 MW or so of capacity slated for HPC uses, CEO Adam Sullivan told Blockworks.
“Our new HPC contracts transform and expand our hosting business and earnings power with stable, predictable, high-margin and long-term revenue that will provide balance to our bitcoin mining business and the more volatile nature of bitcoin pricing,” he added.
CleanSpark mined 417 BTC last month, down 42% from 721 BTC the month prior.
The company had said it intends to be one of the most active acquirers in the industry post-halving. It agreed to buy 75 MW worth of mining sites in Wyoming for $18.75 million last month.
“As we continue to grow our hash rate, we are on a trajectory to rapidly recover our production to pre-halving levels,” CEO Zach Bradford noted.
Australian miner Iris Energy’s bitcoin production in May was 230 BTC — 36% less than the month before.
Meanwhile, Riot Platforms mined 215 bitcoins in May, down 43% from 375 BTC in April.
The Texas-based miner did however collect $7.3 million worth of power and demand response credits during the month. The company is among those with the option to sell their rights to the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) to balance the grid by reducing their energy consumption.
Riot CEO Jason Les previously told Blockworks that Riot would have more windows to curtail power in a declining hash price environment.
“We view our contracts as being a hedge against declining mining break-evens after halving because of our ability to sell power anytime the price of power exceeds mining break-even amounts,” Les added.
Bitfarms, the company that Riot recently tried to acquire, mined 156 BTC last month — down 42% from April.
Terawulf’s BTC production dropped 44% month over month to 186 BTC in May.
Singapore-based Bitdeer saw less of a drop than most other miners — generating 184 BTC in May, a 31% month-over-month decrease.
That showing came in a month during which stablecoin issuer Tether bought roughly 18.6 million shares. The company generated $100 million in gross proceeds from the share issuance and intends to use that for data center expansion and ASIC-based mining rig development.
Hut 8, another large public miner, had not reported how many BTC it mined in May as of Friday morning. Neither had Stronghold Digital Mining, which signaled last month it was not ruling out selling the company as part of a “formal strategic review process.”