Bitcoin miner Marathon Digital Holdings Inc. announced on Friday that it produced a record-breaking 1,245 bitcoins (BTC) in May. This is a staggering increase of 77% from last month and a whopping 366% from May 2022. The figure brings the company’s year-to-date (YTD) Bitcoin production to 4,141 BTC.
Ordinals Drive Up Transaction Fees
Marathon attributed the increased production rate to two main factors: an increase in hash rate and a significant increase in transaction fees. Transaction fees accounted for around 11.8% of the total bitcoin produced last month, substantially boosting Marathon’s revenue.
According to Marathon, the emergence of Ordinals significantly increased transaction fees in May, sometimes exceeding the 6.25 BTC block reward.
Marathon’s operational hash rate increased by 9% month-over-month (MoM) to 15.2 exahashes in May. Moreover, the company increased its installed hash rate by 13% MoM to 20.1 exahashes.
The company has been investing in its mining operations in recent months, adding more miners to its fleet and expanding its mining facilities.
“With the construction of Applied Digital’s facility in Ellendale, ND progressing and optimizations across our fleet continuing, we believe we are on track to reach our 23 EH/s target near the middle of this year,” the company said.
Marathon Raises $500K for Bitcoin Developers
Furthermore, the company had unrestricted cash and cash equivalents of $97.3 million and raised some funds for Bitcoin developers in May. During the month, Marathon announced that it was joining forces with Brink to raise up to $1 million to support Bitcoin Core developers. In less than four days, the company collectively raised nearly $800,000 for Bitcoin Core developers, $500,000 of which is Marathon’s contribution.
The latest news comes as Bitcoin’s value rose again after a significant decline last year. At the time of writing, the cryptocurrency is trading at around $27,000, up by more than 60% from year to date. Marathon’s success in May could signal a lucrative future for the company as the demand for bitcoin continues to rise.
