‹ Back

With Riot Blockchain Topping The List, Here Are The Largest Public Bitcoin Mining Companies In 2023

 

By Nerly Shammah May 15, 2023

 

The majority of the world's largest publicly traded bitcoin mining companies are running on billions of losses as of 2022 financial reports. However, as of May 2023, a top 5 miner by market capitalization is reported to be sitting on over $92 Million in profits excluding all operations costs.

 

 

What is Bitcoin Mining? 

 

Bitcoin mining is the process by which "companies" or "individuals" set up mining rigs(hardware) and run various Bitcoin mining software for the purpose of contributing to the chains' security by solving various complex mathematical problems to verify transactions posted to the chain. 

 

In return for the "work done", these companies or individuals are rewarded with bitcoins as mining or block rewards, in addition to all fees paid for transactions present in the mined or verified block. The consensus protocol on which bitcoin mining and thus governance is based is called "proof of work(PoW)" which is arguably the most energy-intensive but also the most secure consensus mechanism amongst all other blockchain consensus protocols. 

 

That said, as of 2023, various debates have made headlines on bitcoins energy consumption with many suggesting a migration to less energy-intensive algorithms like proof of stake(PoS) of which Ethereum, the first advanced smart contracts compatible chain had migrated to, successfully. Regardless, most bitcoiners are against this idea and thus the network is unlikely to ever take this path, the solution to its restrictive tech has been to deploy several layer two blockchains or side chains like the lightning network to bring more robust use cases for bitcoin. 

 

Now, the question on many people's minds is often how much bitcoin miners make when factoring in the cost of operations and also, who are the largest miners in the world? 

 

Riot Blockchain Is The Largest Bitcoin Mining Company

 

Yes, Riot Blockchain as of May 2023 is the largest publicly traded Bitcoin mining company with a market capitalization of about $1.77 billion. With a price per share of $10.61 being reported to have about 153,895,123 outstanding shares as of the end of 2022. That said, Riot Blockchain has however not had the best year earnings as it has reported over -$540 million in net losses, the worst trailing 12 months earnings reports over many years. 

 

Now you know the largest bitcoin mining company but are there more alike? 

 

Here Are The Top 3 Largest Public Bitcoin Mining Companies In 2023

 

● Riot Blockchain

● Marathon Digital Holdings

● Cipher Mining

 

Riot Blockchain: $1.77 Billion in market capitalization, Riot Blockchain is an American-based bitcoin mining company aiming to operate large-scale mining in the United States. Although Riot Blockchain had reported a $259.2 Million total revenue as of 2022 financial reports. Riots' net losses during this period are approximately -$540 Million, total assets summing up to a valuation of $1.31 Billion, a share price of $10.61 as of May 2023, and total liabilities sitting at about $160 Million as of the latest financial reports according to data from companiesmarketcap.com.

 

Riot Blockchains' current hash rate is 10.5 Eh/S and is expected to be 12.6 Eh/S as Riot has secured purchase agreements for s19 miners, scheduled for delivery in the Q1 of 2023. At the time of writing, Riot Blockchain has about 94,176 miners producing about 2,115 Bitcoins in Q1 2023, Riot Blockchain reported a total revenue for the first three months of 2023(Q1) to be $73.2 Million. 

 

Marathon Digital Holdings: "We’re different. We're currently in the process of building one of the largest, most agile, and most sustainably powered Bitcoin mining systems in North America while remaining asset-light." 

 

Marathon Digital Holdings is the second largest public bitcoin mining company with $1.74 Billion in market capitalization. However, similar to major mining companies in 2022-2023(Q1), the company has incurred more net losses than gains. As of the latest reports, this totals -$700 Million in TTM earnings as of 2022 financial reports(essentially net losses, despite $51.1 Million in 2023 Q1 revenue ). Marathon Digital Holdings' total assets sum up to a valuation of $1.19 Billion, Marathon Digital Holdings' share price is $8.92 as of May 2023. The company's total liabilities sit at about $800 Million as of the latest financial reports according to data from companiesmarketcap.com, a significantly higher debt and obligations compared to Riot Blockchain.

 

Cipher Mining: "Four Data Centers Operational and Hashing at All-Time High Hash Rate Capacity of Over 6.0 Exahash per Second (“EH/s”)" 

 

"Purchased 11,000 Canaan A1346 Model Mining Rigs Expected to be Delivered and Energized in Q3 Bringing Self-Mining Hash Rate Capacity to 7.2 EH/s" 

 

"GAAP Diluted Net Loss of $0.03 per Share (Non-GAAP Diluted Net Income of $0.03 per Share)" 

 

Cipher Mining is also a United States-based mining company aimed at strengthening Bitcoin’s critical infrastructure. With a $540 Million in market capitalization, Cipher Mining is the third largest public bitcoin mining company. Like other miners, Cipher Mining has recorded significant losses that place its mining operations under profits. At the time of writing, this is a total of -$37.22 Million in earnings as stated in 2022 financial reports. Cipher Mining being the 5276th most valuable company in the world based on its market cap has total assets valued at $401 Million. Ciphers' shares are valued at $2.10 per share, a 20% increase over the last year. The total recorded liabilities of the company as of the last financial reports is about $75.57 million according to companiesmarketcap.com.

 

Other large bitcoin mining companies include Canaan, Hut 8 Mining, TeraWulf, Bitfarms, Hive blockchain(not to be confused with the delegated proof of stake powered blockchain for building scalable, fast dApps, the Hive blockchain"hive.io."), Iris Energy, But Digital, Argo Blockchain, Stronghold Digital Mining, Bit Nile, Bit Mining, Core Scientific, and Greenidge Generations Holdings. 

 

The total market capitalization of these bitcoin mining companies is at $6.84 Billion across 16 companies with 3 top based in the US. Canaan happens to be the only bitcoin mining company as of Q1 of 2023 with a closing profit that is over its net losses. At the time of writing, Canaan recorded a profit of $92.33 Million at a $480 Million valuation. Based on the latest financial reports, Canaans' liabilities total $67.05 Million with total assets valued at over $700 Million, according to companiesmarketcap.com.

 

Is Bitcoin Mining Still Profitable In 2023? 

 

Yes, Bitcoin mining is still profitable in 2023. However, poor management of resources may lead to significant losses as we've seen with many of the companies listed above in the past year. Although these losses are mostly due to the decline in Bitcoin's price value of which not all bitcoins mined have been sold, the cost of mining 1 Bitcoin reported by miners like Riot Blockchain is currently at $10,354.