SBI decides to withdraw crypto mining completely from Russia

[Wimex]

The conflicts between Russia and Ukraine have brought with them quite a delicate controversy for mining companies, many of which have chosen to withdraw from Russia to avoid any mishap, but doing so brought with it significant losses. SBI Holdings was one of these companies that decided to partially stop mining operations just at the moment when the conflict between these two nations began. This fact caused them to lose approximately “2400 million yen”. Furthermore, according to data extracted from the “BTC.com” blockchain:

SBI Crypto mining hash rate plummeted around 40% from 5,600 petahashes per second (PH/S) in mid-February to 3,300 PH/S on August 18, 2022.

Despite the fact that this country was one of the largest cryptominers in the world, circumstances have led them to decide to withdraw completely from Russia. Could the SBI present losses again? Taking into account the current situation of bitcoin mining, could withstand the blow?

Source: https://cointelegraph.com/news/sbi-lost-40-of-hash-rate-after-stopping-mining-in-russia-data

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[DaveF]

More and more businesses are pulling out of Russia, so this is really not that surprising.
As when China banned mining and all the miners migrated elsewhere last year, many miners are migrating again. Be it for political reasons like this, or the quest for cheaper or more reliable power or unfriendly regulations it's going to keep happening. The ones that plan ahead and have good business plans will survive, others will fail.

-Dave

[franky1]

firstly

a shift from 5,600,000thash to 3,300,000thash
is not a "loss"
its just a loss of earning potential by not earning as much for a period of time

its just a case of not paying electric and not getting bitcoin.

secondly
this downshift of 2,300,000thash translates to taking 20,900 asics offline (estimating their using asics that are 110thash each)

they can easily ship them to another country within a fortnight and be in 100% operation again within a month
thus not a "loss" loss. but just a delay of earning potential

[tranthidung]

More and more businesses are pulling out of Russia, so this is really not that surprising.

Not surprising and it should happen, for goods.

As when China banned mining and all the miners migrated elsewhere last year, many miners are migrating again. Be it for political reasons like this, or the quest for cheaper or more reliable power or unfriendly regulations it's going to keep happening. The ones that plan ahead and have good business plans will survive, others will fail

It is worthy to put into consideration that at all time high, total mining hashrate from Russia is less than one from China in contribution to total global mining hashrate.

So let's assume this migration has any short term effect that should be smaller than what happened with the Great Mining Migration from China 2 years ago. Finally, things are fine from that migration, so no worry about Russia Mining Migration.

Despite of some weaknesses and bias factors from data collection methodology, you can check this topic. Just to have a historic view.

• After a few months of China crackdown on mining. Check it out!

[hZti]

they can easily ship them to another country within a fortnight and be in 100% operation again within a month
thus not a "loss" loss. but just a delay of earning potential

With rising difficulty, rent for warehouse, employees and credit payments that are not just delayed earnings like form a hobby miner. Those are actual losses since the money can't just be regained later.

[pooya87]

What I'm more curious about is whether this gap that was created in Russia is going to be filled in another way like other "gaps". After all there was an extra electricity capacity that was being converted to money and is not anymore. So they can either attract another mining farm with cheap electricity or start buying ASICs slowly and fill that gap themselves.

[so98nn]

They are not gonna incur loss from it, all they would do is shift the hardware's into more feasible country. In fact this is great opportunity for them to rethink about the crypto friendly country with less taxes or zero taxes and also more greener energy to run the farms. With the crypto gaining less popularity in the Russia and War conflicts, its already No-Crypto Land in the future.

I believe, SBI can actually plot good strategies ahead and re-establish the firm elsewhere. Currently they are just going down with the revenue, losses would be something like: hardware getting burned down in ashes, ceasing of their assets etc.

However, at this point they have everything in the hand. It's just about how they plan their journey ahead.

[franky1]

firstly the SBI "gap" of hashrate. is only 2.3exahash
OUT OF 210 (~1%)

secondly
if we calculate the 2.3exa mining out of 900coins(210exa hetwork) a day
that ~1.1% is 9.9coins a day.

at a $12.5k mining efficient costper btc (assuming high efficient asic and low electric cost)

lets call it 10btc a day for easy math = $125k cost a day if they were mining that extra 2.3exa
which over a month is $3,640,000, which over 6 months(feb/august)
$21,000,000 = 2,874,070,500(yen)  COST TO MINE THAT EXTRA  2.3exa

however the bitcoin PRICE is not $12.5k per btc. its $23k
meaning they would have got back
5288m yen from selling them extra 10btc a day for 6 months at current price
which sell - cost=profit of
5288-2874=2414m yen

approximately “2400 million yen”.

so its not a LOSS via outgoing costs..
its just a case of not generating 2400m extra income/profit potential due to lack of activity

its the same way of saying that an apple iphone retails at $600 with a cost of $400
and then stating
N.Korea population of 25m is a loss to apple of $15bill sales and $10bill profit due to no access to N.Korea
though in reality its not a Loss Loss. its just a lack of activity/opportunity to increase potential extra customers/revenue/profit

..
as i said they could have easily shipped out them asics to a neighbouring country and start mining again and then got themselves back upto 5.6exahash within a month

yea EU dont allow cross border shipping on their side but russia can ship out with their friendly neighbours on the other side of russia

[DaveF]

...
they can easily ship them to another country within a fortnight and be in 100% operation again within a month
thus not a "loss" loss. but just a delay of earning potential

I agree with the other stuff but I am going to disagree with you a bit with the 1 month. With the sanctions it is difficult to get stuff out of Russia except to a few countries. From there you would have to get the equipment to a location that is BTC friendly and worth mining in. There would be no point in shipping them back to China....

And then you still have to worry about the stuff originating from a sanctioned country. And the world is still dealing with shipping / logistics delays everywhere so I can easily see this taking much longer then a month.

Which could be why they did take so long to move out, they had to plan a lot.

Just my opinion.

-Dave

[BlockchainMentors]

It is not surprising that more businesses pulled out of russia due to war ..but surprisingly for me that russia was one of them where cyrpto mining was abundant but after war , china emerged as top three miner country after USA and Kazakstan....as we know china had imposed ban on cryptocurrency but indirectly he is in this business of money making.....very clever

[Ozero]

It is not surprising that more businesses pulled out of russia due to war ..but surprisingly for me that russia was one of them where cyrpto mining was abundant but after war , china emerged as top three miner country after USA and Kazakstan....as we know china had imposed ban on cryptocurrency but indirectly he is in this business of money making.....very clever

Russia has committed military aggression by invading Ukraine and trying to take over its territory, while killing many civilians and deliberately destroying the country's civilian infrastructure. Ignoring international norms and excessive cruelty, of course, causes outrage in the international community and therefore many foreign companies seek to leave Russia even if they suffer material losses. Perhaps the tightening of legislation regarding cryptocurrencies, as well as the controversial attitude of top officials of Russia to the mining of cryptocurrencies on its territory, played an important role here. But such an ending is generally natural. Russia is now rapidly turning into a pariah country with which self-respecting companies do not want to do business.

[buwaytress]

Wonder if any of these companies were involved in all these so-called new industrial zones geared towards mining/blockchain/crypto that many crypto media were talking up after the last ATH. Oblast this and oblast that supposedly putting up new nuclear energy with come-hither eyes to mining companies. Always wondered what happened to them. Even google's not showing me the results I remember used to propagate every coin news site.

[kryptqnick]

It seems that the company didn't fully pull out of Russia, and that their other reason for limiting operations was crypto winter, so it's not all related to the war. They were trying to play on both sides and lost, so I'm not sure I feel sorry for them. Namely, they partly cut their operations in Russia which probably gave them a reputation boost if branded well (as well as safety of not getting on sanctions lists), but they also kept their banking unit in Moscow and some mining in Siberia, so it's not like they really stopped doing business in a country that it trying to destroy another country. As a business, they should've considered relocations as well.

[franky1]

...
they can easily ship them to another country within a fortnight and be in 100% operation again within a month
thus not a "loss" loss. but just a delay of earning potential

I agree with the other stuff but I am going to disagree with you a bit with the 1 month. With the sanctions it is difficult to get stuff out of Russia except to a few countries. From there you would have to get the equipment to a location that is BTC friendly and worth mining in. There would be no point in shipping them back to China....

And then you still have to worry about the stuff originating from a sanctioned country. And the world is still dealing with shipping / logistics delays everywhere so I can easily see this taking much longer then a month.

Which could be why they did take so long to move out, they had to plan a lot.

Just my opinion.

-Dave

recently there was a deal to let through grain from both russia and ukraine to head to neutral country turkey before then shipping onto the middleast and africa.. they said they need about 10 days to organise the shipments and port transfers.
10 days not weeks

grain just harvested in the last few weeks (normal harvest season) would have gone to rott in 10 weeks.. so yea if the can move corn in 10 days. you would be surprised what else can be moved in a short period of time when a neutral country is involved

[teosanru]

The conflicts between Russia and Ukraine have brought with them quite a delicate controversy for mining companies, many of which have chosen to withdraw from Russia to avoid any mishap, but doing so brought with it significant losses. SBI Holdings was one of these companies that decided to partially stop mining operations just at the moment when the conflict between these two nations began. This fact caused them to lose approximately “2400 million yen”. Furthermore, according to data extracted from the “BTC.com” blockchain:

SBI Crypto mining hash rate plummeted around 40% from 5,600 petahashes per second (PH/S) in mid-February to 3,300 PH/S on August 18, 2022.

Despite the fact that this country was one of the largest cryptominers in the world, circumstances have led them to decide to withdraw completely from Russia. Could the SBI present losses again? Taking into account the current situation of bitcoin mining, could withstand the blow?

Source: https://cointelegraph.com/news/sbi-lost-40-of-hash-rate-after-stopping-mining-in-russia-data

Eventually, in the longer term, it will sustain the blow to its mining, but I think the Russia-Ukraine war has hampered the supply chain badly in both countries which is why it has impacted mining companies so much. Moreover these companies know that situation is only going to worsen off which is why they are just trying to move out so that at least can save them further recurring losses even if all of this comes at a big one-time cost.  I think more and more companies from Russia would eventually do these things if all this doesn't stop for next few months to come

[doomloop]

They are not gonna incur loss from it, all they would do is shift the hardware's into more feasible country. In fact this is great opportunity for them to rethink about the crypto friendly country with less taxes or zero taxes and also more greener energy to run the farms. With the crypto gaining less popularity in the Russia and War conflicts, its already No-Crypto Land in the future.

I believe, SBI can actually plot good strategies ahead and re-establish the firm elsewhere. Currently they are just going down with the revenue, losses would be something like: hardware getting burned down in ashes, ceasing of their assets etc.

However, at this point they have everything in the hand. It's just about how they plan their journey ahead.

But is Russia still in sanction? And exporting items from their country could still be prohibited but maybe it's possible to do on their allied countries like on china but the problem is that china have banned bitcoin mining before so even if they are friends with Russia, they may think twice of doing this. They will incur a loss when they are about to deliver these miners from a different country and they will also pay for the people that will do a maintenance for the hardware.

There's also fees for the space that they will be using and others but if their mining business runs well and became a hit, then it's possible for them to recover what they have spent and earn more than that.

[pooya87]

But is Russia still in sanction? And exporting items from their country could still be prohibited but maybe it's possible to do on their allied countries like on china but the problem is that china have banned bitcoin mining before so even if they are friends with Russia, they may think twice of doing this. They will incur a loss when they are about to deliver these miners from a different country and they will also pay for the people that will do a maintenance for the hardware.

There's also fees for the space that they will be using and others but if their mining business runs well and became a hit, then it's possible for them to recover what they have spent and earn more than that.

The problem is existing capacity, otherwise there are a lot of countries that they can go to like Kazakhstan or Georgia. But if they don't have any excess electricity or the infrastructure to accept the new hashrate all at once, there won't be any place for them to go to.
The best option in my opinion is someone inside Russia to buy their ASICs and continue mining on the existing excess electricity and keep the profit inside the country.

[darewaller]

They are not gonna incur loss from it, all they would do is shift the hardware's into more feasible country. In fact this is great opportunity for them to rethink about the crypto friendly country with less taxes or zero taxes and also more greener energy to run the farms. With the crypto gaining less popularity in the Russia and War conflicts, its already No-Crypto Land in the future.

I believe, SBI can actually plot good strategies ahead and re-establish the firm elsewhere. Currently they are just going down with the revenue, losses would be something like: hardware getting burned down in ashes, ceasing of their assets etc.

However, at this point they have everything in the hand. It's just about how they plan their journey ahead.

I agree, green energy is getting subs a lot from many places, meaning if they move their hardware from one place to another that has green zero tax and helps? They could even make money from it.

Well, they have the hardware already so they won't have to pay for that, but moving it will mean that they will get both a bit "down" time that will be profit loss, and there will be moving costs. Aside from that, what are they going to lose? Nothing.

In return, they could get a ton of help and money from some governments to build solar panel stuff or even wind turbine which would be too big but would be very profitable and they would get money, plus they will get tax breaks as well for doing that which will mean they will profit even more in the long term.

[Argoo]

More and more businesses are pulling out of Russia, so this is really not that surprising.
As when China banned mining and all the miners migrated elsewhere last year, many miners are migrating again. Be it for political reasons like this, or the quest for cheaper or more reliable power or unfriendly regulations it's going to keep happening. The ones that plan ahead and have good business plans will survive, others will fail.

-Dave

There is nothing surprising. More than a thousand large companies have already left Russia because of the war it unleashed in Ukraine. In Russia, both exports and imports are sharply reduced. Sanctions isolate it from the outside world. The Kremlin has long understood this and is now desperately looking for a way out between a bad and a very bad option for her to end the war. Even the citizens of Russia have already understood this, they are fleeing this country and taking capital with them. Every month they withdraw more than four billion dollars from Russia, and this situation will not only continue, but also grow. The process has been launched and will continue by inertia even when Putin decides to withdraw his troops from Ukraine and the sanctions are eased.

[buwaytress]

Wonder if any of these companies were involved in all these so-called new industrial zones geared towards mining/blockchain/crypto that many crypto media were talking up after the last ATH. Oblast this and oblast that supposedly putting up new nuclear energy with come-hither eyes to mining companies. Always wondered what happened to them. Even google's not showing me the results I remember used to propagate every coin news site.

They probably are, only takes some investigation to connect the dots. They wouldn't be withdrawing easily if they don't have a back up plan in place. Best thing to do with media isn't to take them seriously, if different outlets are saying the same thing then that's the only time you're going to take them seriously.

Yeah, 3/4 years ago might have gone down the rabbithole myself, digging in the dozens of Russian language media to find corroboration but I stopped thinking any of these developments really have a discernible impact on legislation, let alone market movements. I know it's mainly white noise, especially when the bulk of it comes off regurgitated press releases (which is why 12 sites saying the same thing don't always mean anything), but every now and then a morsel of actual news journalism does give me some joy.