Washington State Bitcoin Miners Get ‘Giga Rekt’ In Bear Market

Now, it’s struggling to make its business model viable in 2018.

Seasonal Positions Available

Giga Watt, a cryptocurrency mining company which set up shop last year in Grant County, Washington, was rolling in the proverbial dough near the end of 2017 when the price of Bitcoin (BTC) skyrocketed from $6,000 to $20,000 in just over one month. As fast as the market can giveth, so too can it taketh away. Bitcoin has fared better than most other coins in the market. However, the price has still seen a 68 percent correction from its all-time high and has put Giga Watt in quite a predicament. Giga Watt, like nearly all the other cryptocurrency mining companies which opened their doors in the wake of the Bitcoin ‘gold rush’ of 2017, are going back to the drawing board to readjust its business plan before it ends up bankrupt.

Switching Lanes

Hong Kong-based cryptocurrency mining goliath Bitmain is having a better time than Giga Watt in 2018, recently posting profits of $750 billion in the first half of 2018, and are preparing to go public. Bitmain has a unique business model in which it mines cryptocurrency with mining rigs that it both manufactures and sells to its competitors. It also owns Bitcoin’s largest mining pools. Smaller scale operations like Giga Watt have been forced to explore different avenues to increase earnings and stay afloat until the next bull run. The team is currently investigating providing cloud-based storage for high data capacity projects — particularly in machine learning and artificial intelligence sectors — while continuing to mine cryptocurrency with the computing power in remaining in their arsenal. Giga Watt interim CEO George Turner recognizes that the company is in a very delicate and vulnerable position at the moment. Do you think more cryptocurrency mining companies will pop up again in the event of another bull run? Will bear markets and growing competition continue to shake out small mining operations in the future? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below!