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News · Nov 10, 2026 · 4 min read

MARA sold 13,597 bitcoin, 40% of its holdings, after mining 2,247 in the quarter

The listed miner told shareholders on 9 November that it sold 13,597 bitcoin for about $1.1 billion after the end of September, six times what it mined in the quarter, to repay loans and build cash for AI infrastructure. The network issued about 18,400 coins in the same weeks.

Firsthand card: "MARA sold 13,597 bitcoin, 40% of its holdings, after mining 2,247 in the quarter", with the figure 13,597 bitcoin sold after September

MARA sold 13,597 bitcoin after the end of September, 40% of what it held

MARA Holdings, one of the largest listed bitcoin miners, said in its third-quarter shareholder letter of 9 November that it sold 13,597 bitcoin after quarter-end at about $81,039 each, for proceeds of about $1.1 billion. It held 34,012 bitcoin on 30 September, so the sale is 40% of its stack. CoinDesk reports the sales took about six weeks.

The coins left over are no longer pledged. MARA used $750.0 million of the proceeds to repay in full the loans it had secured against its bitcoin, which released 17,477 coins that were held as collateral. At 30 September, 19,260 of its coins were loaned or pledged, 57% of the total.

Chart: Bitcoin's price since mid-September. MARA's average sale price of about $81,039 sits inside the range of late October; the price was $74,784 on 10 November. Open the chart

It sold six times what it mined in the quarter

The same letter says MARA produced 2,247 bitcoin in the third quarter. The 13,597 it sold afterwards is 6.05 times that, so most of the coins came from the stack the company had built up, not from the machines.

For scale, our data shows the whole network issued about 18,400 bitcoin between 1 October and 9 November, counting block subsidies and fees. One company's sales were about three-quarters of that. MARA's reported third-quarter revenue was $164.2 million, and CoinDesk notes it reported a profit of $632 million that includes an $885 million accounting gain on the value of its coins.

MARA mined 2,247 bitcoin in the third quarter. It sold 13,597 in the weeks after it.

It plans to sell more, for AI infrastructure and to cover its convertible notes

MARA has changed its mind about keeping coins. CoinDesk recalls that in July 2024 its treasury policy committed to keeping mined production and buying more bitcoin, that it began selling newly mined coins in 2025, and that in 2026 it widened the policy to include its accumulated holdings.

The letter says: "We intend to continue using bitcoin to build cash for purposes such as AI infrastructure opportunities," and goes on to name the puts on its convertible notes that become exercisable next year, and potential share repurchases. Its board has authorised buybacks of up to $500.0 million. CoinDesk adds that its pending purchase of the Long Ridge gas-power business is expected to close in the coming weeks.

MARA puts its energy cost at $39,674 a coin; the best machine does it for $19,489

The letter gives MARA's purchased energy cost as $39,674 per bitcoin, or $30.8 per petahash per day, with power at its owned sites costing $0.04 a kilowatt-hour. Our hashprice, what a petahash earns, averaged $35.01 a day over the third quarter, so the margin over energy for the quarter was thin on MARA's own numbers.

Nigeria's rate for us is 3.9 cents, almost the same as MARA's 4 cents, so the gap is mostly the energy it takes to run a terahash. On 10 November the most efficient machine in stock, the S23 XP Hyd at 8.9 J/TH, uses about $8.33 of electricity per petahash a day at that rate, and makes a bitcoin for about $19,489 against a market price of $74,784. That is the best case, electricity only, and MARA's is a fleet average; the comparison shows what efficiency is worth, not what any one machine does.

What it means for miners

A miner can sell its coins, as MARA has, or keep them. The choice is easier when the electricity behind each coin is a quarter of its price. We argue in Nobody sells the coins to pay the power bill that a machine efficient enough to clear its power on cheap electricity never has to, and in Efficiency decides how many halvings a machine survives why that holds after the next one.

MARA's sale is for debt, infrastructure and buybacks, not for power bills, and it is the company's choice. For an owner with a machine on cheap power, the coins stay in the wallet. Earnings are not guaranteed, and these figures hold today's conditions flat.

Sources and further reading

Disclosure

Firsthand Bitcoin sells and hosts mining hardware, including this machine. No manufacturer, distributor or affiliate programme paid for or reviewed this page and we take no commission on the links above. Historical figures are computed from daily bitcoin price and network hashprice, each day valued at its own prices. Nothing here is investment advice.