Tether plans major expansion into BTC mining with $500M investment: Report

Tether is planning a large-scale expansion into Bitcoin (BTC) mining, according to Paolo Ardoino, who is expected to take the helm at the company soon. 

The stablecoin firm may spend around $500 million in the next six months on the construction of mining facilities and investments in other miners, Ardoino told Bloomberg in an interview. The company will build mining facilities in Uruguay, Paraguay and El Salvador as it grows its computing power to 1% of the BTC mining network. The new sites would have a capacity of between 40 and 70 MW, he continued.

We’re quite close to add another extremely powerful piece of the puzzle for @Tether_to ecosystem.

Total of 5 mind-blowing projects (and counting) for 2024.
Couple of these could obliterate some popular Web2 centralized services for good.

Pure Real World Ecosystem aka “Things…

— Paolo Ardoino (@paoloardoino) November 12, 2023

The mining investment includes part of the $610 million debt financing facility extended to German miner Northern Data Group that Tether announced at the beginning of the month. The loan was in line with a pattern of rising loans made by Tether (USDT) this year. Tether had already made a strategic investment in Northern Data Group in September to back artificial intelligence initiatives.

Related: Bitcoin institutional inflows top $1B in 2023 amid BTC supply squeeze

Ardoino further said Tether expected to amp up its direct mining operations to 120 MW by the end of the year and reach up to 450 MW by the end of 2025. The company is also considering a 300-MW facility and is setting up its facilities inside containers that can be moved when electricity prices change. Ardoino said in the interview:

“Mining for us is something that we have to learn and grow over time. We are not in a rush to become the biggest miner in the world.”

Ardoino will become Tether CEO in December and will retain his position as chief technical officer of parent company Bitfinex, according to plans announced in October.

Tether did not respond to an inquiry from Cointelegraph by the time of publication.

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