Crypto-mining rigs go on deep discount as the industry scrambles to respond to tech changes and soaring energy costs

Mining rigs hit rock bottom… prices. Bitmain, a major manufacturer of the computers that create new bitcoin, said it's slashing the cost of its machines. The fire sale comes as mining-rig prices have already tanked 70% this year. The issue: plunging BTC prices + surging electricity costs = lower profits for mining companies, which means lower demand for new equipment.

• Stocked: As crypto prices climbed last year, miners rushed to preorder rigs from manufacturers like Bitmain and Canaan to lock in supply. Higher prices = higher incentive to mine.
• Boxed: As mining costs rise and returns fall, analysts estimate there are up to 500K new rigs sitting in storage in the US alone (almost 40% of all computing power used to mine BTC is US-based).

Mining demand… caves in. The largest US publicly traded BTC miners had $1B in second-quarter losses this year. It's not just bitcoin: ethereum's Merge last week — from proof of work (energy-hungry) to proof of stake (efficient) — means ethereum miners and their expensive rigs are no longer needed. The result: the cost of GPUs for ETH mining fell off a cliff (BTC and ETH miners use different types of computers to unearth digital gold).