00:00Lauren, why? Why would Starboard push Riot to do this?
00:04They want to see Riot get moving, right? They want to see them do what others are doing.
00:08I mean, Riot has been moving into the AI data center space already, but it's competitive, and there's a lot
00:15of others doing it.
00:16You want to get those hyperscalers in. You want to be able to transition these centers into something new.
00:21There's different technology and different equipment that's needed, so I think...
00:25Well, I get why that area is hot, because of AI data centers. That makes sense.
00:30But is there something that's changed with Bitcoin mining that specifically makes that less appealing right now?
00:34Oh, absolutely. So, you know, the price of Bitcoin has gone down quite a bit, at least since October, and
00:40the profitability of the miners has just plummeted.
00:44So it's becoming an unsustainable business model. They have to be able to make money from the Bitcoin that they're
00:48mining.
00:49At the same time, they can make money from the AI data center, you know, so the tradeoff is there.
00:54What about consolidation? Starboard also pushing Riot says it could be a good candidate for something like that.
01:00Have we seen a lot of M&A in this space?
01:01We haven't seen very much M&A, but there's a lot of talk about it in the miners, as well
01:06as the DATs.
01:07Like, there's parts of the crypto industry that are just ripe for consolidation.
01:10It's just a question of when that's going to happen.
01:12We'll see you next time.
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