Public Bitcoin miners sold more BTC in the first quarter of
2026 than in all of 2025, as low margins forced many operators to liquidate
reserves to cover operating costs.
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The surge in sales comes even though Bitcoin’s price remains
above the previous cycle peak, underscoring how rising difficulty and lower
block rewards have squeezed profitability across the sector.
Record BTC Sales as Hashprice Slumps
Publicly traded miners including Marathon, CleanSpark, Riot,
Cango, Core Scientific and Bitdeer sold more than 32,000 BTC in Q1 2026, based
on preliminary disclosures and data compiled by TheEnergyMag.
This already exceeds total net sales for all of 2025 and
surpasses the roughly 20,000 BTC miners sold in Q2 2022 during the
Terra-Luna-driven market turmoil. Just over a year ago, the same group ended
2024 by adding nearly 17,600 BTC to their balance sheets, pushing combined
reserves above 100,000 BTC.
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The driver of the reversal is mining economics, not spot
price. Hashprice, expected mining revenue per unit of computing power, has
hovered in the low 30 dollars per PH/s/day, near record lows. At those levels,
margins are thin or negative for operators with older machines or higher power
costs, making BTC sales the fastest way to fund operations and meet debt
obligations in a tougher financing environment.
The industry, however, is not moving in one direction. Some
firms now sell aggressively to maintain liquidity, while others continue to
accumulate. American Bitcoin Corp.
Bitdeer #BTC Weekly Update🔹 BTC Holdings: 0 (pure holdings, excluding customer deposits)🔹 BTC Output: 189.8 BTC🔹 BTC Sold: 189.8 BTC🔹 Net BTC Added: -943.1 BTC📅 Data as of February 20, 2026.#Bitcoin #BTC #BitcoinHoldings #BitcoinCommunity #BTCMining $BTDR pic.twitter.com/vtvBVEui0Q
— Bitdeer (@Bitdeer) February 21, 2026
ABTC, the proprietary mining arm of Hut 8,
has built reserves of more than 7,000 BTC since early 2025 while ramping its
proprietary hashrate to about 28 EH/s. The company reports an all-in cash cost
near 55,000 dollars per bitcoin, giving it room to hold production rather than
sell into weakness.
Miners Split Between Sellers and Accumulators
Elsewhere, private operators with ultra-low-cost power, such
as those using flared natural gas, continue to mine profitably even at current
hashprice levels. At the same time, miners are increasingly turning to software
tools and fleet optimization to squeeze more efficiency from existing hardware,
rather than relying solely on large-scale expansions.
In one classic case, Bitdeer shifted from holding Bitcoin on
its balance sheet to using it primarily as a source of liquidity. In January, the Singapore-based miner produced 668 BTC, a 430% year‑on‑year increase,
and pushed its self‑mining hash rate to 63.2 EH/s, with total proprietary hash
rate at 65.1 EH/s.
Around the same
time, other miners have followed the same path, with Riot Platforms selling
about 200 million dollars’ worth of Bitcoin to finance its day-to-day
operations and support its expansion into artificial intelligence.
This article was written by Jared Kirui at www.financemagnates.com.
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