On February 3, Sphere 3D announced the purchase of the latest and ultra-efficient NM440 ASICs in the amount of $1.7 billion. After the publication of the news, the company’s shares soared by 40%. However, more and more information is coming in about the creation of a snag: “a representation of the accessible, tangible, but in fact non-existent.” In case of immediate deployment of the computing battery, Sphere 3D becomes the largest public miner of Bitcoin with a 16% share of the world’s hashrate – this is what bribed investors.
The declared energy efficiency of the NM440 is 20.2 joules per terahash, which is 4.5 times higher than existing analogues and 36% better than the announced Antminer S19 Pro + Hyd, which will go on sale no earlier than autumn. The S19 Pro+ Hyd has good energy efficiency ratings due to water cooling, so it is not clear how the NM440 will cope with heat dissipation in the absence of a visual water circuit.
All that is in the hands of the community is loud statements and a graphic image of a promising ASIC. However, it turned out to be stolen from Cerebras, and even someone else’s logo is visible on the presentation model. Following the claim, NuMiner removed the image from the site, calling it “drawn for marketing purposes.”