Argo Blockchain’s share price climbs as it declares deal to build new crypto-mining facility

Shares in crypto mining firm Argo Blockchain have soared by over 30 per cent today after it announced a deal to develop a new mining facility in West Texas.

It means the company’s share price is now almost 4,400 per cent more valuable than at the same time last year when it was trading at less than 5p.

The group said it had hired digital currency miner Navier on a monthly retainer to provide ‘consulting services’ such as developing an electrical infrastructure that will support 200MW of mining at the future facility in Helios.

Crypto-mining provider Argo Blockchain has hired digital currency miner Navier to help develop a new mining facility in Texas

Navier will further work on the installation of ‘next-generation’ immersion technology to increase mining productivity and the life cycle of installed mining rigs and provide heat control, Argo said.

‘We are thrilled to collaborate with Argo to help build such an innovative green mining facility in West Texas,’ remarked Josh Metnick, the chief executive of the Chicago-based business.

‘Navier is committed to ensuring that Argo builds one of the most cost-effective, power-efficient, and structurally scalable industrial mining sites in the world.’

Only set up in 2018, the company was named after a French engineer Claude-Louis Navier, and has worked on facilities from steel and alloy plants to a hydroelectric dam in Wisconsin.

It mines digital currencies, which are increasingly becoming a popular asset class among institutional investors and major businesses like Tesla, who now allow its cars to be bought using Bitcoin.

Argo Blockchain has been one of the biggest beneficiaries of this rise, hence its skyrocketing share price, and last month, it raised £26.8million in a new share fundraising.

Argo Blockchain has signed an MoU with with DMG Blockchain Solutions, a blockchain and virtual currency platform, to create a Bitcoin mining pool wholly powered by green energy

The firm also recently registered its third consecutive month of record profits and mining revenues in March, when the number of bitcoins it held rose to 764, and its revenues grew by more than 50 per cent.

Commenting on the Navier deal, Argo’s boss Peter Wall said the new infrastructure ‘will not only provide greater control over our operations but also meaningfully expands our mining capacity. At this facility, we believe we will have access to some of the cheapest renewable energy worldwide.’

There are growing concerns about the environmental damage caused by cryptocurrencies, leading many companies like Argo to pay greater attention to their carbon footprint.

Last month, it signed a Memorandum of Understanding with DMG Blockchain Solutions, a blockchain and virtual currency platform, to create Terra Pool, a Bitcoin mining pool that would be wholly powered by green energy.

It wrote: ‘The initiative aims to expedite the shift from conventional power to clean energy and reduce the impact of Bitcoin mining on the environment.

‘The mining pool will provide a platform for cryptocurrency miners to produce Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies in a sustainable way.’

Mining for the currency requires a considerable amount of computer power to solve complex ‘blocks of transactions,’ which create new currency when solved.

The University of Cambridge has estimated that the most commonly mined cryptocurrency, Bitcoin, uses more electricity than the whole of Argentina.

This post first appeared on Dailymail.co.uk