Bitcoin (BTC -0.35%) is raining from the digital sky, or so it seems given the profusion of cryptocurrency businesses rushing to the stock exchange lately. The most recent example is Cipher Mining, a privately held company that announced Friday it has agreed to go public via a merger with a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC), Good Works Acquisition Corp (GWAC).
"Mining" is essentially the digital production of a cryptocurrency -- Cipher Mining specializes in Bitcoin. According to the company, its merger with Good Works Acquisition will create a business with an enterprise value of $2 billion. The combined entity will be known as Cipher Mining and be listed on the Nasdaq with the ticker symbol CIFR.
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Operationally speaking, Cipher Mining says it expects "to be positioned as a U.S.-centric Bitcoin mining champion," that will "provide investors the opportunity to invest in the Bitcoin industry via a leading mining company operating in a highly transparent and well-regulated environment." It aims to hit a cumulative deployed capacity of 745 megawatts by the end of 2025.
The current form of Cipher Mining is a recently formed subsidiary of a more generalized cryptocurrency/blockchain company, Bitfury Group, which was founded in 2011 and concentrates on mining hardware, in addition to other cryptocurrency-related software and services. According to Cipher Mining, Bitfury Group has mined over 600,000 bitcoin to date. Presumably, that company would no longer be involved in the activity once Cipher Mining is on the stock exchange.
Bitcoin's recent precipitous rise is bringing related companies out like mushrooms after rain. Cipher Mining, at least, should enjoy the position of being a somewhat offbeat and specialized play on that popularity.
