(Bloomberg) — Stablecoin issuer Tether Holdings Ltd. has acquired a $100 million stake in Bitdeer Technologies Group, the US-listed Bitcoin miner owned by Chinese billionaire Jihan Wu, with an option to purchase an additional $50 million in shares within a year.
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The two firms entered into a subscription agreement for a private placement of 18.6 million Class A ordinary shares, Bitdeer said in a statement on Friday, which generated $100 million in gross proceeds. There was also a warrant to purchase up to five million in additional shares at $10 per share. The private placement closed on Thursday. Cantor Fitzgerald & Co. acted as the placement agent.
The deal will fund an expansion of Bitdeer’s data center operations, development of ASIC-based crypto mining equipment and other general corporate purposes, Bitdeer said. The companies didn’t disclose what percentage of Bitdeer is now held by Tether under the agreement. Tether didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
The agreement marks a major step forward for Tether in its plan to become a major Bitcoin miner, having begun construction of its own mining facilities in Uruguay, Paraguay and El Salvador last year. The British Virgin Islands-incorporated company, which issues the world’s most used cryptocurrency USDT, said in November that it planned to spend half a billion dollars within six months on the effort.
Read More: Biggest Stablecoin Firm Tether Is Becoming a Major Bitcoin Miner
Bitdeer is one of the largest public crypto miners listed in the US with a market capitalization of around $670 million. Headquartered in Singapore, Bitdeer has datacenters in the US, Norway and Bhutan. Shares of Bitdeer, which had slumped more than 40% this year, rose about 6.5% to $6.20.
Bitdeer was previously in talks with private credit firms to arrange about $100 million in financing, Bloomberg News reported in March. It was unclear if those discussions remain ongoing following Tether’s injection.
Read More: Crypto Miner Bitdeer in Talks With Private Credit for Capital
Bitcoin mining involves the operation of power-hungry computers that secure the blockchain, earning new tokens as a reward. In April, these rewards were halved as part of a programmed upgrade to the Bitcoin network called “the halving,” which occurs every four years. In essence, the change made it about half as profitable to be a Bitcoin miner.
Conversely, Bitcoin’s price reached a record high in March, driven in part by optimism surrounding newly-launched spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds in the US. Bitcoin traded up around 0.7% at $68,800 on Friday.
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