BitRiver CEO ‘Worth $230M,’ as Russia’s Crypto Mining Growth ‘Outpaces US’
Tim Alper is a British journalist and features writer who has worked at Cryptonews.com since 2018. He has written for media outlets such as the BBC, the Guardian, and Chosun Ilbo. He has also worked...
The BitRiver CEO Igor Runets is worth $230 million, a Bloomberg article has claimed. And the crypto mining chief says that Russia’s growth in the sector now outpaces that of the United States.
The Bloomberg piece claimed that Runets was “building a fortune” from President Vladimir Putin’s “U-turn” on crypto mining policies.
BitRiver is arguably the biggest of Russia’s fast-growing industrial crypto mining players. Like many Russian miners, it focuses most of its capacity on Bitcoin (BTC) mining.
Bloomberg explained that its $230 million valuation was based on estimates of the company’s worth, as well as the approximate cost of the firm’s soon-to-be-completed data centers.
BitRiver is hoping to bring 1MW of crypto mining capacity online in the near future, with data centers being built all over the nation.
Runets told RBC that both Russian and “international customers” had shown an interest in backing his firm.
“We can see this as another confirmation of the thesis that Russia is catching up with the US in the crypto mining sphere, outpacing the United States in terms of growth. And in the years ahead, [Russia] may become the leader.”
Some international crypto mining investors have pulled out of Russia following the outbreak of war in Ukraine.
However, the mining sector received a major boost on September 1, when industrial mining was officially recognized as a form of entrepreneurship.
Russian crypto miners have hinted this has seen an increase in investment. Many believe this will lead to a rise in banks’ involvement in the sector.
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