Canada-based HIVE Digital has become the latest public mining company to enter the arms race to acquire the next generation of bitcoin miners.
In an announcement on Friday, HIVE said that it had signed a purchasing agreement for 7,000 units of Bitmain’s Antminer S21 model, scheduled for delivery by Q2 of next year. Based on similar contracts disclosed by other competitors, HIVE’s deal is estimated to be valued at around $20 million, or about $14/TH/s.
As highlighted in a Miner Weekly newsletter issue earlier this month, public mining companies have committed $1.2 billion to invest in mining hardware ahead of the halving next year. Factoring in additional preorders recently announced by Cipher Mining, Iris Energy, and now HIVE, the total investment commitment has risen to $1.4 billion.
HIVE’s preorder of S21s follows two recent spot orders it signed for 9,800 units of Bitmain’s S19K Pro model. The company added that the new miners are expected to help improve its fleet efficiency to 25 J/TH once fully installed.
HIVE had the highest average daily hashcost among its public peers in Q3. With a fleet efficiency of 38 J/TH at the time, its hashcost implied a blend-in energy rate of $59.2/mWh. If the energy rate remains constant, improving fleet efficiency to 25 J/TH would enable HIVE to reduce its daily hashcost to $35.5/PH/s, bettering preparing itself for post-halving uncertainties.
HIVE reported an installed hashrate of 4.18 EH/s as of the end of November but announced on Friday that its existing miner inventory has increased to 6.6 EH/s since then. It anticipates reaching a total capacity of 8 EH/s with the arrival of the S21 miners.