Riot Blockchain: 108 New Bitcoins Mined and 1000 New Antminer S19 Pros To Be Deployed

On May 5, 2020 Riot Blockchain? released a ‘Production Update’ for the month of April 2020, which included the latest official news regarding the company’s mining? operations: including hardware distribution, procurement, and performance.

The company announced that it had successfully produced 108 new Bitcoin? tokens between the dates of March 31, 2020 and April 30, 2020: which constituted an increase of 13% to the company’s total BTC inventory. This was achieved using Riot’s fleet of 4000 Bitmain S17 mining? rigs, which the company claims have a “combined hashing power capacity of 248 Petahash per second (“PH/s”).

Production rates are only likely to increase in the future, with Riot having announced that it had purchased 1000 top-of-the-line Bitmain Antminer S19 Pros which it hopes to arrive “by early July 2020”. The company believes that this will result in a 46% increase in operating hash? rate.

Coinmint - Riot Blockchain? Partnership

"[We have] expanded our co-hosting services to meet the needs of first-in-class cryptocurrency? mining? companies and we are excited to partner with Riot Blockchain?. With the upcoming halving?, Coinmint's low-cost electricity and 120MW of capacity will allow Riot to continue to grow operations even as bitcoin? rewards? are reduced." - Ashton Soniat, CEO of Coinmint

300 of the 4000 rigs currently being operated for Riot Blockchain? rigs had only been deployed recently, for a trial period as part of a recent partnership between Riot Blockchain? and Coinmint (announced April 14, 2020).

The hardware was sent from Riot’s Oklahoma City, Oklahoma office to Coinmint’s Massena, New York facility (located inside a refurbished Alcoa Aluminium smelter) to test expectations of increased efficiency and the potential for expanding hashing capacity.

Coinmint describes its operation as being “the largest digital currency data center in the world”: providing off-site mining? services to clients: offering “modular design for maximum efficiency” in addition to “low cost, large scale mining?”. Other partners beyond Riot Blockchain? include Cointelegraph.

Riot: The Nasdaq Listed Blockchain? Company

Riot Blockchain? is a multifaceted organisation which focuses predominantly on its blockchain? operations specifically cryptocurrency? mining? (Bitcoin?) - as well as maintaining a biotechnology business which the company was originally founded behind (before changing its name and direction).

It is also one of the few examples of a blockchain? company that is listed on the Nasdaq global stock exchange? (under the symbol ‘RIOT’), a fact which drew legislative ire in the form of a recently dismissed lawsuit.

A document filed April 30, 2020 revealed that a lawsuit initiated originally by Creighton Takata had concluded after it was dismissed by a District Court Judge. This lawsuit pertained to the defendant’s 2017 name change (from ‘Bioptix’ to ‘Riot Blockchain?), and accused the company of changing its name as a means of artificially boosting its share price.

Conversely, the defendant stated that the name change was purely representative of its directional shift in business focus towards cryptocurrency? and blockchain? sectors.

In Other News...

University of Cambridge’s ‘Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance’ (CCAF) has released the ‘Bitcoin? Mining? Map’ which provides data visualisations based on approximations of the geographical distribution of global Bitcoin? hashrate - including hasrate share by country. This tool provides free access to valuable insights on the state of global Bitcoin? mining?.