Compass Mining Appoints Two Interim CEOs in Bid To Rekindle ‘Goodwill’

Bitcoin mining and hosting firm Compass Mining has appointed two new interim CEOs following the resignation of the firm’s head Whitney Gibbs and Chief Financial Officer Jodie Fisher.

The embattled mining company — supplier of ASICs and operator of bitcoin mining operations — said Tuesday it has appointed Chief Technology Officer Paul Gosker and Chief Mining Officer Thomas Heller as interim co-presidents and CEOs.

“Through this restructuring, the company is wholly focused on regaining the goodwill of our stakeholders and the community, as well as delivering on our mission of providing best-in-class service for miners of all sizes,” Compass said in a company post Monday via its website.

Compass’ board of directors will begin seeking out a permanent president, CEO and CFO immediately, the firm said. The appointments come as Compass has been caught up in a string of accusations by hosting firm Dynamics Mining over its alleged failure to meet its power consumption charges.

Blockworks attempted to contact Compass but did not receive a response by press time. Blockworks also spoke with one employee who declined to comment.

Dynamics, which had a contract with Compass, said it terminated its “Master Hosting Service Agreement” with the Delaware-based supplier earlier this month, citing six late payments and three nonpayments, the company said in a tweet Sunday.

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In a June 10 letter to Gibbs from law firm Gordon, Fournaris & Mammarella, P.A., acting on behalf of Dynamics, Compass is accused of failing to pay its utility bill as well as monthly hosting fees. Oxford and Lewiston, both Dynamics facilities maintained by Compass, also failed to make payments in violation of the agreement, the law firm said.

“All you had to was pay $250k for 3 months of power consumption,” Dynamics said in a follow-up tweet on Monday. “Since you don’t give your clients their Serial Numbers I couldn’t even help them. Twitter is the voice of your customer base, not the courtroom.”

Compass, however, denied the accusations levied against it, claiming Dynamics “misunderstood” the contracts it had signed with respect to Dynamics’ facilities, according to a separate post late Tuesday.

“Compass has performed all of its obligations under its contracts with Dynamics, including its financial obligations,” the firm said. Dynamics operates approximately 1% of Compass Mining’s contracted capacity, according to Compass.

Accusations against Compass come as large numbers of bitcoin miners face possible liquidation after taking out high-interest loans to fund their spending habits when bitcoin prices were relatively buoyant.

Depressed crypto prices, accelerated by recent developments with Terra’s stablecoin collapse and crypto lender Celsius’ liquidity woes, now appear to be eating into profitability margins for the mining hosting firms supplying the picks and shovels to crypto miners.

Miners rely on three main areas for keeping business activity out of the red, including a higher bitcoin price, lower or cheaper electricity prices and access to high-performance specialty mining rigs known as ASICs (application-specific integrated circuits).

All three elements, amid the market downturn, are now causing headaches for miners, as well as their creditors and other counterparties including mining operators and ASIC suppliers.

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