Greenidge Generation President Dale Irwin has shed more than one-third of his holdings in company common stock since the the cash-strapped Bitcoin mining company lost its state appeal for an air permit on May 8.
After selling 25,000 shares for $63,797 on May 20, Irwin sold another 8,777 shares for $24,638 on Tuesday, leaving him with 70,962 shares — about 1 percent of the company’s total common shares.
Irwin had already sold 5,646 shares on Feb. 28 to raise $23,600.
The last two sales came in the wake of the state Department of Environmental Conservation’s May 8 ruling that cancelled Greenidge’s administrative appeal of the DEC’s June 2022 denial of its application to renew its air permit.
The company called that ruling “absurd …. utterly preposterous” and said it planned ask a state court to impose and injunction to block it. It had not done so as of Thursday.
The DEC said has not said when or whether it plans to order Greenidge to shut down its power plant in Dresden. The agency said the company is legally allowed up four months to file suit in state court. Its air permit extends to the final day of that appeal window.
Irwin’s stock sales have drawn attention on an investor website that posts public comments.
“Dale Irwin (GREE president & Dresden plant operator) selling shares at near lifetime lows,” one Stocktwits poster wrote. “He might as well be publicly announcing what he thinks of the plant’s permit outlook. He didn’t even wait to see how the injunction request goes.”
Irwin did not immediately respond to an email requesting comment on his trades.
Meanwhile, Greenidge is planning for the sale of up to 2.52 million new common shares now held by Armistice Capital LLC, according to a preliminary prospectus Greenidge filed Wednesday with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Armistice will sell the shares, and Greenidge “will not receive any of the proceeds,” the filing said.
If all the new shares are sold, Greenidge’s total outstanding shares will increase to 9.6 million from the current 7.1 million.
That prospect prompted another Stocktwits commenter to write: “GREE beaten down by dilution.”
Greenidge shares (NASDAQ Ticker symbol GREE) have held steady in recent days and were trading at $2.87 in the early afternoon. The shares have fallen by about 58 percent this year.
Greenidge did not immediately notify shareholders when the DEC canceled its air permit appeal May 8, but it did disclose it a week later in its quarterly 10-Q filing with the SEC.
The company said it planned to challenge (in state court) the DEC’s 2022 denial of its application to renew its Title V air permit. And it said it would request a restraining order to allow the Dresden plant to continue operating “during the pendency of the litigation,” which it said could last for years.
Both the DEC and Earthjustice, an environmental law group, have said they would oppose any bid by Greenidge to seek an injunction.
Failure to obtain the injunction or the air permit renewal “could have a material adverse effect on us and our ability to continue operating as a going concern,” the 10-Q filing said.
While the company estimated that “substantially all of its cash resources will be depleted by the end of the first quarter of 2025,” it said it was working to obtain additional short-term outside financing.
Greenidge, which is controlled by Connecticut-based Atlas Holdings, has operated its Bitcoin mining facility at the Dresden power plant since 2019.
Environmental groups have alleged that the plant’s operations have harmed and continue to harm Seneca Lake. For several years, its water intake system lacked screens required by federal law. And water discharges into the Keuka Outlet have warmed Seneca Lake beyond levels allowed in state regulations, absent special waivers.
The company also acknowledges environmental liabilities of more than $30 million for a landfill and a coal ash dump that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is requiring it to clean up.
Peter is a three-time Pulitzer nominated reporter covering environmental issues through his first-of-its-kind digital publication The Water Front. He’s won an array of Associated Press, UPI, and Society of Professional Journalist awards. His reporting on environmental issues continues to be featured in prominent New York publications and is available on FingerLakes1.com through an exclusive content partnership. Have a question or lead? Send it to [email protected].