Like it happened in the second quarter, North American miners have seen yet another quarter of increased revenue quarter-over-quarter in the wake of China’s crypto mining ban.

China used to capture the larger share of the crypto mining market – about 50-60% of the network’s hashrate. However, with the reduced competition from China following the crypto mining ban in May and the subsequent mass migration of miners elsewhere, the Americans have been able to produce more blocks even as they reportedly added new machines to their fleets over time to boost their hashrate power.

As a result, they were able to collectively mine a total of 5,734 Bitcoin in the third quarter of 2021 – 79% higher than Q2 and 155% from Q1, according to latest figures from Luxor Mining which provides analysis, data, and hashrate insights. 

The Q3 figures build on presented data for the past quarter as the biggest miners in North America continue to cash in on the China exodus.

More is still likely to come

While the miners have expanded their hashrate significantly this year, Luxor Mining suggests that their hashrate output is likely to double or even triple by next year going by pre-ordered rigs waiting to either be delivered or be operational. Its hashrate index insight states: 

“If their forecasts for 2022 are accurate, these miners will collectively add just over 30 EH to their operations next year. When this anticipated hashrate comes online (and China’s mining industry migrates to new homes and adds to the computing load), Bitcoin’s hashrate is going to pump—hard. We anticipate that the network’s hashrate will exit 2021 in the ballpark of 180 EH, and with the tidal wave of hashrate that is expected to come online in 2022, we will easily see 250 EH and beyond next year.”

The market outlook is coming as Bitmain, the manufacturer of the most popular brand for ASIC Bitcoin miners, confirmed it will stop shipping its Antminer mining machines to mainland China (excluding Hong Kong and Taiwan) starting October 11. 

The company says its decision is to be in strict compliance with the laws and regulations of the location of its entity. 

A recent Luxor Mining analysis suggests that Bitmain is likely to stop producing in China and move to its Malaysian and Indonesian facilities. If that happens, the piece says the shift will “send bigger wrinkles through the already-severely-ruffled ASIC supply chain” which could see prices of ASICs becoming more expensive with time.  

Meanwhile, there may be a new development in the wake of the Chinese mining ban. A Bitcoin mining machine that will “fill the vacuum” created by “recent crypto policy changes combined with ongoing global component shortages [that] have served to remove valuable digital mining production capacity” is in the pipeline.

Sino-Global says it has entered a joint venture with Highsharp blockchain technology, hardware, software and cloud computing company to collaborate in the engineering, technical development and commercialization of a proprietary bitcoin mining machine under the name Thor.

The venture is to be filed as a utility patent application under US patent laws.