Mike Novogratz Calls Helios a `Transformative Cquisition` for the Galaxy

Galaxy Digital Holdings CEO Mike Novogratz described the Helios mining deal as a “transformative acquisition” for the firm as it works to increase its exposure to the Bitcoin mining sector.

It was announced in December that the crypto investment firm acquired Argo Blockchain's flagship mining facility for $65 million. 28 as part of Argo's drastic action to avert bankruptcy.

Tweeting about the December deal. On December 29, Novogratz stressed that Galaxy is a “strong believer” in the long-term future of Bitcoin (BTC) and that the company will continue to accelerate its mining initiatives:

"Bear markets are for building. We believe in BTC for the long term and expect the lowest cost miners to win over time. Helios is a transformative acquisition that will expand our mining capabilities and services as we continue to build for the decentralized future.”
1 of 2021. Since we started bitcoin mining in the quarter, we have outsourced our miners to hosting providers. But we have always had the idea that we would vertically integrate our mining capabilities.

Explaining the deal in more detail, the Galaxy CEO noted that the firm has a special “thesis” on how to approach the mining industry:“low-cost electricity, a very efficient team” and “buying ASIC miners cheaply.”

"This is a recipe for success in mining even when the hash rate rises," he said.

The latest data from the Hashrate Index showed that Bitcoin ASIC miner prices are hovering at lows not seen since at least 2021, and the prices of the most efficient ASIC miners have fallen by 86.8% from the peak in May 2021.

Galaxy has five business lines in the fields of trading, asset management, crypto mining, venture investments and investment banking. According to its website, it currently has assets worth $1.9 billion under management.

Galaxy mainly used hosting services for its mining operations. However, Novogratz notes that Helios, with a capacity of 200 megawatts (MW), will not only allow the company to operate miners at its site, but also host others.

Helios has the ability to potentially scale a lot to make it one of the largest miners on the market. Argo Blockchain had previously stated in May of this year that it “plans to increase its electricity capacity to 800MW in the coming years".”

At the time, the firm also said that it expects Helios to reach a mining capacity of 5.5 exahas BTC per second by the end of the year and eventually have the potential to reach 20 EH /s.

It seems that Galaxy has some money to splash in the middle of the 2022 bear market, considering that in addition to the purchase, Argo Blockchain also made a $35 million equipment financing loan.

The move also adds another blow from earlier this month, when Galaxy snapped up crypto custody platform gk8 for an undisclosed fee.

After the defunct crypto lender snapped up the firm for $115 million in 2021, GK8 was being put up for auction as part of the Celsius bankruptcy process.

Novogratz called the acquisition “a very important cornerstone in our effort to create a truly full-service financial platform for digital assets."

Source: cointelegraph.com