Board Appointment and New Hardware

 2 January 2020

ARGO BLOCKCHAIN PLC

("Argo" or "the Company")

Board appointments 

New mining hardware set to commence production

Argo, a UK-based provider of enterprise-scale crypto-mining services (LSE:ARB), is pleased to announce that Peter Wall has been appointed as the Company's chief executive officer with immediate effect. Mike Edwards will remain the Company's executive chairman.

Peter was a member of the management team that founded Argo and has been Vice President of Operations since then. He has been responsible for overseeing the day-to-day operations of the mining organization as well as the management of the software development team.

Peter is a technology entrepreneur based in Ottawa, Canada and is President of Vernon Blockchain, a company specialising in the design, build and management of cryptocurrency mining operations in Canada and worldwide. Peter has been involved in cryptocurrency mining in Quebec, both as a personal miner and a consultant, for the past five years.

Peter is currently a director of Entobiotics Inc (Canada), Vernon Blockchain Inc. (Canada), Weave Technologies Inc. (Canada) and Leaf Studios PLC (UK).  In the past five years he has also been a director of Orange 22 Pte. Ltd (Singapore).

Separately, Gil Penchina is stepping down as non-executive director from January 1st and will be succeeded by Ian Macleod. Ian joins Argo with more than 20 years of international experience providing strategic legal advice at board level. Since 2007, Ian has served as Corporate Secretary and General Counsel to the Teligence Group of Companies in Canada which operate in telecoms, payments, ecommerce and software development. He is responsible for acquisitions, structuring and the strategic direction of the Teligence portfolio.

Mike Edwards, executive chairman and co-founder of Argo, said: "I am delighted to welcome Peter as our new chief executive officer. His knowledge of Argo and his broad and deep experience in cryptomining will serve the Company well as it moves into its next phase of growth."

"I would also like to thank Gil Penchina for his invaluable contribution to Argo and wish him all the best in his future projects. We welcome Ian Macleod as a non-executive. Ian brings significant skills in legal matters, corporate governance and regulation."

Peter Wall commented: "I am excited and honoured to be appointed chief executive and look forward to working closely with the team to deliver long-term growth and to achieve our aim of becoming the world's biggest publicly listed cryptominer."

New mining hardware delivered

Further to the announcement of 30 October 2019, the Company is pleased to announce that it has taken delivery of 3,616 Bitmain Antminer T17 machines which are being installed and expected to be operational by January 10th, 2020.

The new machines represent 159 petahash (PH), an increase of 75% from the Company's existing installed base of mining machines.

Argo is on track to operate a total production base of approximately 17,000 machines, or 640PH, by the end of the first quarter of 2020, increasing the Company's total mining capacity by 204% from its current base.

The remaining 6,384 machines required to achieve this target are on order and expected to be delivered in batches from early January.

For further information please contact:

About Argo:

Argo Blockchain plc is a global data centre business that provides a purpose-built and flexible platform for mining of leading cryptocurrencies for the enterprise-scale and institutional sectors worldwide from operational centres in Canada. The Company is headquartered in London, UK and its shares are listed on the Main Market of the London Stock Exchange under the ticker: ARB.

www.argomining.co

See Argo's largest facility in Quebec:

https://youtu.be/LDWWaZ75Zbk