Marathon Digital Holdings, Inc., a prominent US-based Bitcoin mining company, experienced a mix of success and challenges during the first quarter of 2024.
Marathon’s finance showed significant growth, with Q1 2024 revenues surging by 223% compared to the same period in 2023, reaching $165.2 million. Net income also rose impressively by 184% to $337.2 million year-over-year.
However, the company faced operational hurdles that impacted its Bitcoin production. Despite an overall increase in Bitcoin mined compared to Q1 2023 (2,811 BTC, up 28%), there was a notable 34% decrease from Q4 2023. Marathon’s CEO, Fred Thiel, attributed this decline to unexpected equipment failures, maintenance issues, and weather-related challenges at various mining sites.
Marathon’s Bitcoin production during this period was outpaced by Core Scientific, which reported mining 2,825 BTC in Q1 2024.
Despite these setbacks, Marathon Digital experienced substantial expansion in its hash rate, growing by 142% year-over-year to 27.8 exahash per second (EH/s). The company also introduced new technological innovations and products, including the Anduro multi-chain Bitcoin layer-two network, aimed at promoting Bitcoin’s development and adoption.
Additionally, Marathon pursued growth through acquisitions, adding over 1.1 gigawatts to its mining capacity, with 54% of this capacity now directly under its control. Marathon aims to double its hash rate to 50 EH/s by the end of 2024.
However, Marathon’s financial performance in Q1 2024 fell short of analysts’ expectations. Reported revenues missed the Zacks consensus estimate by 14.80%, prompting Zacks Equity Research to adjust Marathon Digital’s stock (MARA) status to “hold.”
As a result, MARA’s stock price declined during after-hours trading to $18.60 on May 9 and has seen a year-to-date decrease of 14.30%.