Major Bitcoin Sale by Mining Company
Riot Platforms, the Bitcoin mining and data center operation, made a significant move in December 2025. They sold off 1,818 Bitcoin for about $161 million. That sale brought their total Bitcoin holdings down to 18,005 BTC. At current market prices, that’s still worth around $1.7 billion, which is nothing to sneeze at.
I think what’s interesting here is the timing and the scale. Selling nearly two thousand Bitcoin in one month is a substantial transaction. But then again, Riot has been using this strategy for a while now. They’ve historically liquidated Bitcoin and issued stock to fund their operations and expansions.
Mining Performance and Operational Updates
While they were selling Bitcoin, they were also mining more of it. Riot reported mining 460 Bitcoin in December. That’s actually up 8% from November, though it’s down 11% compared to the same period a year earlier. The company released these figures in their monthly operating data on Tuesday.
Their mining operations seem to be getting more efficient. Riot expanded their deployed hash rate to 38.5 EH/s. They also benefited from higher power and demand response credits, which totaled $6.2 million for December. Their all-in power cost dropped to 3.9 cents per kilowatt hour, which is pretty competitive in the mining space.
Fleet efficiency improved year over year too. That’s probably important given how energy-intensive Bitcoin mining can be. Every little efficiency gain matters when you’re running operations at this scale.
Reporting Changes Ahead
Here’s something that caught my attention: December marked Riot’s final monthly production update. Moving forward, they’ll be shifting to quarterly reporting instead. The focus will be more on overall business performance and data center strategy, rather than just monthly mining numbers.
That change makes sense from a business perspective, I suppose. Monthly updates can be noisy, and quarterly reports might give a clearer picture of longer-term trends. But for those of us who follow the mining industry closely, we’ll have to adjust to getting updates less frequently.
It’s worth noting that despite selling a significant chunk of Bitcoin, Riot still maintains a substantial position. 18,005 Bitcoin is a serious holding by any measure. The sale seems to be part of their broader financial strategy rather than a loss of faith in Bitcoin itself.
What I’m curious about is where that $161 million will go. Operational expansions, as they mentioned, but the specifics would be interesting to know. New mining facilities? Upgraded equipment? Maybe both.
The mining industry continues to evolve, and Riot’s moves reflect that. Selling Bitcoin to fund growth, improving efficiency metrics, changing reporting practices – it all points to a maturing sector. Not that it’s mature yet, but it’s certainly moving in that direction.
Anyway, we’ll have to wait for those quarterly reports to get a fuller picture of how Riot’s strategy plays out. In the meantime, they’ve got a lot of Bitcoin on their books and some cash from this sale to work with.
