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Commitments and Contingencies
6 Months Ended
Jun. 30, 2022
Commitments and Contingencies Disclosure [Abstract]  
Commitments and Contingencies

NOTE 11. COMMITMENTS AND CONTINGENCIES

Litigation

The Company is not a party to any material legal proceedings and is not aware of any pending or threatened claims. From time to time, the Company may be subject to various legal proceedings and claims that arise in the ordinary course of its business activities.

Commitments

In the normal course of business, the Company enters into contracts that contain a variety of indemnifications with its employees, licensors, suppliers and service providers. The Company's maximum exposure under these arrangements, if any, is unknown as of June 30, 2022. The Company does not anticipate recognizing any significant losses relating to these arrangements.

Power and hosting arrangements

The Company is party to several power and hosting arrangements, as described below.

Luminant power arrangement

On June 23, 2021, the Company entered into a power purchase agreement, which was subsequently amended and restated on July 9, 2021 and further amended on February 28, 2022, with Luminant for the supply of electric power to the Company’s wholly-owned site in Texas for a term of five years with a subsequent automatic annual renewal provision (as amended, the “Luminant Power Agreement”).

The Luminant Lease Agreement leases the Company a plot of land where the planned data center, ancillary infrastructure and electrical system (the “Interconnection Electrical Facilities” or “substation”) will be set up for the Texas site. The Company also entered into the Purchase and Sale Agreement dated June 28, 2021, with amendment and restatement on July 9, 2021 (as amended and restated, the “Luminant Purchase and Sale Agreement”) with another Luminant affiliate. The Company entered into the Luminant Lease Agreement and the Luminant Purchase and Sale Agreement to build the infrastructure necessary to support its planned operations. The Company determined that the Luminant Lease Agreement and the Luminant Purchase and Sale Agreement should be combined for accounting purposes under the new lease guidance (collectively, the “Combined Luminant Lease Agreement”) and that amounts exchanged under the combined contract should be allocated to the various components of the overall transaction based on relative fair values.

Under the Luminant Power Agreement, the Company is required to provide Luminant with collateral of approximately $12.6 million (the “Independent Collateral Amount”). Half, or approximately $6.3 million, of the Independent Collateral Amount was paid to Luminant on September 1, 2021 and is recorded in security deposits as of June 30, 2022 and December 31, 2021, as the Company received notice that Luminant had commenced construction of the Interconnection Electrical Facilities. The other half will be due 15 days prior to the date on which the Interconnection Electrical Facilities are completed and made operational. The Independent Collateral Amount will remain in place throughout the term of the Luminant Power Agreement. Details of the construction of the Interconnection Electrical Facilities, including collateral arrangements that are in addition to the Independent Collateral Amount, are set out in the Luminant Purchase and Sale Agreement. Under the Luminant Purchase and Sale Agreement, the Company provided approximately $3.1 million as collateral separate from the Independent Collateral Amount, which is also recorded in security deposits as of June 30, 2022 and December 31, 2021.

The Combined Luminant Lease Agreement is effective from the date of the Company’s notification of the Effective Date of the Business Combination, which was August 27, 2021, and shall continue for five years following completion of the substation, subject to renewal provisions aligned with the Luminant Power Agreement. Financing for use of the land and substation is provided by Luminant affiliates, with monthly installments of principal and interest due over a five-year period starting upon transfer of legal title of the substation to the Company (estimated total undiscounted principal payments of $13.1 million). At the end of the lease term for the Interconnection Electrical Facilities, the substation will be sold back to Luminant’s affiliate, Vistra Operations Company, LLC at a price to be determined based upon bids obtained in the secondary market.

Standard Power hosting agreement

Under the Standard Power Hosting Agreement entered into on February 3, 2021 by the Company and 500 N 4th Street LLC, doing business as Standard Power (“Standard Power”), the Company agrees to provide Standard Power with Bitcoin miners with a specified energy utilization capacity necessary to generate computational power at three Ohio facilities (the “Miners”). Standard Power, in turn, is obligated to (i) host the Miners in specialized containers and provide the electrical power and transmission and connection equipment necessary for the mining and (ii) host, operate and manage the Miners there, in each case in accordance with the terms and conditions of the Standard Power Hosting Agreement.

The Standard Power Hosting Agreement provides that Standard Power shall provide an electric power infrastructure, including containers, necessary to operate Miners with a specified energy utilization capacity at facility 1 in Ohio in accordance with the specifications and power availability date set out in the availability schedule.

Thereafter, Standard Power shall provide the hosting capacity, housing and equipment for Miners with the specified energy utilization capacities that will be delivered to the facilities in accordance with the availability schedule, as may be amended and supplemented. Standard Power also undertakes to be responsible for the proper installation and the costs of work for hosting the Miners in the specialized containers in each facility and for the proper care and maintenance of the Miners, the facilities and the containers in which the Miners are installed.

Under the Standard Power Hosting Agreement, the Company is obligated to pay a hosting fee and an operational service fee. The Company’s payment obligations under the Standard Power Hosting Agreement become effective on a pro rata basis according to the number of Miners in operation in accordance with the terms of this agreement. The Standard Power Hosting Agreement provides for a term of five years with automatic five-year renewal provisions. The associated fees paid under the Standard Power Hosting Agreement will be expensed as services are received.

WindHQ power arrangement and joint venture

The WindHQ Joint Venture Agreement provides that the parties shall collaborate to fund the construction and buildout of certain specified Data Centers at locations already identified by the parties (“Initial Data Centers”). Each Initial Data Center will be owned by a separate limited liability company (each, an “Initial Data Center LLC”), and WindHQ and the Company will each own 51% and 49%, respectively, of the initial membership interests of each Initial Data Center LLC.

The WindHQ Joint Venture Agreement includes a development schedule for additional electrical power capacity through the joint identification, procurement, development and operation of additional Data Centers (“Future Data Centers”). Each Future Data Center will be owned by a separate limited liability company (each, a “Future Data Center LLC”, and collectively with the Initial Data Center LLCs, the “Data Center LLCs”), and the Company and WindHQ, or respective affiliates of the Company or WindHQ, shall become a member of each Data Center LLC by entering into a limited liability company agreement for each such Data Center LLC (“LLC Agreement”). WindHQ will own at least 51% of the initial membership interests of each Data Center LLC and the Company will own a maximum of 49% of the initial membership interests of each Data Center LLC. Furthermore, under the WindHQ Joint Venture Agreement, WindHQ is required to procure energy for Future Data Centers at the most favorable pricing then available. Similarly, the Company is required to procure the applicable equipment needed for the Future Data Centers at the most favorable pricing then available.

Under the WindHQ Joint Venture Agreement, WindHQ agrees to provide a series of services to each of the Data Centers, including but not limited to: (i) the design and engineering of each of the Data Centers; (ii) the procurement of energy equipment and other related services such as logistics for each of the Data Centers; and (iii) the construction work for each of the Data Centers. Furthermore, the Company is required to support and monitor (remotely) the operations of the hardware at each Data Center (particularly the mining servers) as required under the WindHQ Joint Venture Agreement.

A development fee equal to 2% of capital expenditures in respect of the initial development of each Data Center shall be paid 50% to WindHQ and 50% to the Company. Furthermore, a fee equal to 2% of the gross revenues of each of the Data Center LLCs will be payable monthly, based on the immediately prior month gross revenue of such Data Center, 50% to WindHQ and 50% to the Company.

For each Data Center, WindHQ and the Company will cooperate to prepare a financial model incorporating the relevant economic factors of such Data Center, and both WindHQ and the Company will provide the initial funding required for each Data Center on a pro rata basis in accordance with the parties’ respective ownership interests in the applicable Data Center LLC.

In the absence of any material breaches by either party, the WindHQ Joint Venture Agreement may only be terminated by mutual written consent of both parties.

Currently, it is not anticipated by management of the Company that the Company’s investment in any of the individual Data Center LLCs will meet the definition of a variable interest entity in accordance with ASC 810, and the Company will not have a controlling voting interest in any of the Data Center LLCs. Based upon the Company's expectation that they will have significant influence over the operations and major decisions of the Data Center LLCs, the Company’s 49% ownership in each individual Data Center LLC will be separately accounted for under the equity method of accounting, as the Company does not expect to exercise control over the Data Center LLCs.

See discussion of the Alborz LLC Agreement entered into on January 28, 2022 between the Company and Alborz Interests DC LLC (a subsidiary of WindHQ) and the Bear LLC Agreement entered into on May 16, 2022 between the Company and Bear Interests DC LLC (a subsidiary of WindHQ) above in Note 8.