CleanSpark reports Q3 earnings, 16 EH/s is on the horizon

On Wednesday, CleanSpark released third quarter earnings, reporting an operating hash rate of 9 exahashes per second and a 47% revenue jump compared with the same period last year. 

CleanSpark CEO Zach Bradford announced that the company’s year-end goal of reaching 16 exahashes per second (EH/s) is fully funded, which includes miners, facilities and other infrastructure, he said on an earnings call. 

Bradford said CleanSpark is well positioned in the market and expressed excitement for the future of the world’s largest digital asset, citing the recent spate of bitcoin spot ETF applications. He expects approvals of bitcoin spot ETFs in “a matter of months, not years.”

This somewhat reflects Galaxy CEO Mike Novogratz’s statement on Tuesday that the process of the SEC reviewing these ETF applications probably has a six month window.

Bradford is in particular watching BlackRock, the largest asset manager in the world and a major player in the race to a bitcoin spot ETF. But he also pointed out that there are trillions of dollars worth of assets under management by the firms applying, which he said he believes could jumpstart bitcoin if the ETFs prove popular.

“[BlackRock’s] track record suggests that they believe there is a path to successfully launch an ETF. Now, although there can be no guarantee this will occur, if it does, we would expect to see substantial inflows of funds into Bitcoin,” Bradford said. 

More on CleanSpark’s expansion plans

The Nevada-headquartered company boasts a total miner fleet of around 150,000 units, with another 60,000 on hand or pending delivery, Bradford said on the call. 

Many of those miners are set to be a part of the expansion of CleanSpark’s data center in Sandersville, Georgia. The site currently operates at about 80 megawatts, but the upgrade will add 150 megawatts.

“We are now set to nearly double our hash rate in a matter of a few months with the expansion of Sandersville site,” Bradford said. 

The additional miners that have been purchased and the buildup of Sandersville are fully funded, according to Bradford. 

CleanSpark’s other sites in Georgia are also contributing to the hashing gains throughout 2023.

The data center in the city of Dalton, which CleanSpark acquired last quarter, is now running at “full capacity,” Bradford said. 

CleanSpark also got the mining location in Washington up and running in July, which added 50 megawatts of power and over 15,000 mining machines to its overall operation.

However, the company isn’t just focused on raw numbers of miners or mining locations. It’s also focusing heavily on efficiency.

As of July, its fleetwide efficiency was 29 joules per terrahash.

“This is good but not good enough for us,” Bradford said. “Once all the XPs that are on hand or ordered are plugged in and hashing, we expect to see our efficiency…coming in at approximately 25 joules per terrahash.”

CleanSpark’s stock is up roughly 150% year to date, though it’s down nearly 23% in the past month. 

The stock, which trades under ticker symbol CLSK, closed at $5.05 Wednesday. It has a 52-week low of $1.74 and a high of $7.60.

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