Shares of Marathon Digital Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:MARA), one of the leading Bitcoin mining companies, were down slightly, down about 1.5% in after-hours trading on Thursday. The decline was primarily a result of the company’s failure to meet first quarter revenue expectations due to several operational issues.
In the first three months of the year, Marathon Digital mined a total of 2,811 Bitcoins, a significant decrease of 34% from the previous quarter. The decline in Bitcoin production and resulting revenue was due to a series of unexpected issues, including equipment failures, transmission line maintenance, and higher-than-expected weather-related curtailments at the Garden City location and other locations, as stated in a statement from the company. Recently announced.
Despite these challenges, Marathon Digital reported earnings per share of $1.26 for the quarter, which at first glance appears to have surpassed Wall Street’s expectations of $0.02 per share. However, these numbers are not directly comparable to analyst forecasts due to the company’s adoption of the newly approved Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) fair value accounting rules, which include beneficial mark-to-market adjustments triggered by the recent Bitcoin price surge. .
Marathon is committed to its 2024 operational goals, including increasing mining capacity to 50 exahashes per second (EH/s) and expecting further growth by 2025.
Despite this optimistic outlook, Marathon’s stock price is down 26% this year, while rival Riot Platforms (NASDAQ:RIOT)’s stock price has plummeted 40%. This performance reflects the volatile nature of the cryptocurrency mining sector, which is greatly affected by Bitcoin price fluctuations and operational difficulties.
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