By Anthony O. Goriainoff
Argo Blockchain PLC said Thursday that it swung to a pretax loss for the first half due, mostly due to a reduction in the fair value of digital currencies held on the balance sheet.
The London-listed cryptocurrency miner said pretax loss was 36.9 million pounds ($43.5 million) compared with a pretax profit of GBP10.7 million for the first half of 2021.
Revenue fell to GBP26.7 million from GBP31.1 million in the year-prior period. The company said this was mostly driven by a fall in Bitcoin price and an increase in the global hashrate–or computing power needed for to mining–as well as associated network difficulty level.
The company said there has been a global macroeconomic pullback as central bankers and investors navigate inflation, rising interest rates, as well as the war in Ukraine. It added that this has hurt all financial assets, including Bitcoin and the equity of publicly-traded Bitcoin miners.
“Argo is well positioned to weather the current downturn with its large and highly efficient mining infrastructure, runway for growth, and experienced management team, which has successfully navigated the group through previous crypto winters,” Chief Executive Peter Wall said.
Write to Anthony O. Goriainoff at anthony.orunagoriainoff@dowjones.com
