Bitcoin Surge Pushes MARA Holdings Near $5B as BTC Stack Triples — Despite Production Dip

MARA’s Bitcoin Holdings Soar Near $5B as BTC Tops $103K, Despite Production Dip and Earnings Miss

Bitcoin mining firm MARA Holdings, formerly Marathon Digital, has significantly boosted its Bitcoin reserves, nearly tripling its holdings over the past year to 47,531 BTC — a 175% increase from Q1 2024. With Bitcoin trading at around $102,819, MARA’s total Bitcoin stash is now valued at approximately $4.9 billion, placing it as the second-largest Bitcoin-holding public company, behind MicroStrategy (MSTR), which holds 555,450 BTC.

Bitcoin is trading at $102,660 at the time of publication. Source: CoinMarketCap

Despite the increase in holdings, MARA’s Bitcoin production fell by 19% year-over-year, totaling 2,286 BTC for the quarter. The firm attributed this decline to the latest Bitcoin halving event, which cut mining rewards to 3.125 BTC per block, reducing overall block incentives.

Financially, MARA’s Q1 earnings slightly missed Wall Street expectations, falling short of revenue estimates by 0.35%, according to Zacks Research. The company has only exceeded consensus revenue estimates once in the past four quarters. Nevertheless, MARA stock rose 7.2% on May 8 before dipping 2% in after-hours trading.

MARA is trading at $14.20 at the time of publication. Source: Google Finance

The challenges faced by MARA echo a broader trend among Bitcoin mining companies grappling with rising operational costs and compressed margins post-halving. Riot Platforms reported a nearly 90% increase in the average cost to mine Bitcoin, rising to $43,808 from $23,034 year-over-year. However, Riot beat its $159.8 million revenue estimate by 1%.

Other miners also struggled to meet expectations. CleanSpark missed its revenue estimate by 0.58% with $181.71 million, Core Scientific missed by 8.11% with $79.5 million, and Hut8 saw the largest miss — falling 35% short of its $35 million estimate, reporting just $21 million.

As Bitcoin’s price continues its upward momentum, mining firms are navigating a high-stakes environment of reduced rewards, rising costs, and fluctuating investor sentiment.