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Macquarie Group to pilot ‘green’ Bitcoin mining in partnership with Blockstream
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Australia’s biggest investment bank is getting into eco-friendly Bitcoin mining.
Sydney-based Macquarie Group (ASX:MQG) has partnered with North American Bitcoin mining company Blockstream to develop zero-emission Bitcoin mining facilities.
“The first project will be based in North America and will utilize Blockstream’s enterprise-grade mining facilities and expertise in mining hardware hosting to provide additional security to the Bitcoin network,” Blockstream said in its announcement.
Blockstream in June partnered with Jack Dorsey’s Square, the payments company buying Afterpay (ASX:APT), to build a solar-powered Bitcoin mining facility in the United States.
A top 10 Australian company with 16,459 employees and $563.5 billion in assets under management, Macquarie has been reasonably friendly to crypto.
The asset manager wrote in January that Bitcoin was “increasingly … seen as a legitimate addition to a portfolio, in part due to its returns being uncorrelated with the returns of other major asset classes.”
Macquarie has also lately been emphasising green energy, with 14 gigawatts of green energy assets in operation as of March 31, with another 30GW in development.
The bank has been approached for comment but didn’t immediately have anything to add to Blockstream’s announcement.
Blockstream’s vice president for financial products, who also worked as Macquarie’s Taiwan-based head of equity capital solutions from 2016 to 2018, posted that he was thrilled by the news.
“As one of the early Bitcoin advocates within Macquarie, am very excited to be part of this and proud that Macquarie chose Blockstream as a partner in the Bitcoin space,” wrote Jesse Knutson.
The founder and chief executive of a Brisbane-based Bitcoin fund for institutional investors posted that it was “significant news,” given Macquarie’s size and influence as Australia’s largest fund manager.
“Great news to @Blockstream for welcoming traditional institutions to the table,” posted Jeff Yew.
