Argo Blockchain Hires Derivatives Trader to Navigate Market Rout, Sells BTC to Reduce Loan

Bitcoin miner Argo Blockchain (ARB) said it hired an in-house derivatives trader to better navigate a market rout that in June saw bitcoin post its biggest monthly price drop in 11 years.

The company also sold 637 BTC at an average of $24,500 to pay for operating costs and a loan from Galaxy Digital, it said in a statement on Thursday.

Crypto miners have been selling bitcoin as their revenues have slumped along with the bear market. The firm said that it has been using derivatives to limit downside risk since fourth-quarter 2021, and hired a full-time trader to improve its “capabilities within risk and treasury management.”

As of the end of June, London-listed Argo had $22 million outstanding with Galaxy Digital, according to the statement. The firm signed the $30 million loan collateralized by bitcoin in December 2021, according to its annual earnings report.

Argo’s margin narrowed to 50% in June from 55% in May and 75% in April, driven by higher electricity costs at the Helios facility in Texas and the bitcoin (BTC) price drop. The miner revised its margin figure for May from 62% as it took into account newly received invoices.

Last month, Argo’s revenue rose 10% to ?3.38 million ($4.35 million) as it produced 46% more bitcoin than the previous month due to increased hashrate and uptime.

Argo is one of four companies that have put down orders for new crypto mining chips from Intel. The others are Hive Blockchain, Griid Infrastructure and Jack Dorsey’s Block (formerly Square).

Intel has shipped its Blocksale chips, Raja Koduri, executive vice president and general manager of the Accelerated Computing Systems and Graphics at Intel, tweeted on June 29.

Argo shares were little changed in London as of 09:10 UTC.

Read more: Crypto Miners Face Margin Calls, Defaults as Debt Comes Due in Bear Market