Bitcoin Minor Mara Holdings (Mara) stocks outperformed their peers on Friday, even after the first quarter results missed Wall Street estimates.
Jeffries analysts said Bitcoin BTC prices rose in the second quarter of this year and Mara focuses on more sustainable energy sources such as solar-powered and flare-gas-driven data centers, so electricity costs should fall in the next quarter and support margins.
“Mara is expanding its infrastructure with a 114 MW wind farm, fully energizing the 25 MW microflare gas data center. Both should reduce electricity costs.”
If mining companies continue to buy more such power supplies, it will help the company profitability, Petersen writes. “Continued acquisitions of electricity assets are expected to further reduce energy costs, increase margins and better prepare companies for the next half.” Peterson repeated the holding ratings of the stock, but raised its price target from $13 to $16.
Once a highly profitable business, Bitcoin Mining has seen its profitability crash dramatically in the last bare market. Worse, rising electricity costs for mining continue to plague margins.
This pressure forced most miners to diversify their businesses to other revenue streams, such as hosting artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing (HPC) data centers. Mara was one of the few miners who didn’t jump into the AI sector any time soon, but focused on other diversification paths, including trading revenue services, mining, buying Bitcoin in open markets, and reducing electricity costs through green energy sources.
The final point about low power costs seemed to have hit a chord in the market.
Kevin Dede, an analyst at HC Wainwright, said this would separate Mara from the mining peer.
“Here we’re rehashing this by gently or forcing our competitor’s mining business to migrate to our competitors and address the rapidly evolving HPC opportunities,” he said.
With a $28 purchase rating and price target, Dede appears to reflect the sentiment that Mara can reduce costs by focusing on these types of power supplies.
The story continues