Japanese IT giant GMO Internet published the last monthly report of its crypto mining operation on Tuesday showing a massive drop in mining revenue.
Quashing the reports of a complete shutdown of its in-house mining operation, the firm revealed its plans to move its mining operation to a location with cheap electricity cost where it can pocket some profits.
“We will relocate the mining center to a region that will allow us to secure less expensive power supply,” GMO noted.
As shown in the report, the Bitcoin mining reward for the company has increased drastically over the months - from 21 BTC in December 2017 to 528 BTC in June 2018 and 960 BTC in December. GMO explained that a significant decrease in the total Bitcoin mining Hash Rate had boosted its share of mining reward.
However, due to the slumping Bitcoin prices, the mining revenue of the company took a massive hit.
The report also showed that the company did not indulge itself in any Bitcoin Cash mining in December as there were zero mining rewards.
Once a Good Business, Now a Bust
GMO first jumped into the crypto mining business in late 2017 driven by the Bitcoin rally. It was a good business decision for the company, at least for the time being, as BTC prices soared to around $20,000. The initial monthly reports showed massive profits hoarded by the company, and its heavy mining infrastructure even gave competition to established mining firms like BitFury.
GMO soon entered the market of mining hardware manufacturing and first unveiled a 7nm semiconductor chip-laced Bitcoin mining device called GMO 72b in June 2018.
The Japanese conglomerate is now shutting down its hardware manufacturing business.
“GMO Internet will review the revenue structure of its in-house mining business, and no longer develop, manufacture, and sell mining machines, as announced in the press release ‘Recording Extraordinary Loss Related to The Cryptocurrency Mining Business Restructuring’ published on December 25, 2018,” GMO noted.
“We will no longer provide the monthly report on cryptocurrency mining business from this year. We will disclose the business results and the KPIs of our cryptocurrency mining business when making a quarterly earnings announcement, thereby helping our stakeholders to understand the business properly.”
