RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Argentine cryptocurrency mining company Bitfarms became the country’s ninth to reach unicorn status after yesterday’s Bitcoin surge in value to US$45,821.
Two Argentine founders succeeded in raising Bitfarms’ business valuation to over US$1 billion, placing the business, operating in Canada and listed both on Wall Street and the Toronto Stock Exchange, among Mercado Libre, Globant, Despegar and OLX, to name a few.
The company founded by Emiliano Grodzki and Nicolás Bonta in 2017 and driven by the BTC’s higher value since May and China’s increasing restrictions on cryptocurrency mining, consolidated a pre-market rise that reached peaks of 25% last night.
“Bitcoin is being institutionalized: from being an invention, or bad word for many, it became accepted as part of the economy by many traditional investors. There are 20 companies in the world which have been working on this task for 5 years,” Grodski said.
“The market recognizes the companies behind the infrastructure making this ecosystem legal and sustainable, ensuring that the protocol is safe. It is a business of the future: like investing in the Internet in 1994,” he added.
Bonta said that they are “the only company in the sector audited by a big four.” “Ours is a long-term job and business, we are in the market to stay. Being listed in the U.S. was a very important boost,” he emphasized.
The company has 5 facilities in Quebec, Canada, with an electrical power of 69 MW, and there are plans to build another 5 plants with a total of 100 MW more between them.
Meanwhile, digital assets rose after Ethereum’s blockchain update. Bitfinex’s CTO Pablo Ardoino said to Bloomerg that “optimism seems to have returned to the cryptocurrency markets.”