Scandal-ridden Compass Mining lays off 15% of workforce, slashes exec salaries by 50%

Another day, another digital asset company announces layoffs. This time, it’s Compass Mining, a block reward miner that has been rocked by scandals lately, including failure to pay its vendors and the resignation of senior executives.

Compass Mining announced that it’s laying off 15% of its workforce “and implementing significant compensation and spend reductions across the rest of the business.”

The company, which has offices in the U.S., Iceland, and Canada, sells mining hardware and block reward mining hosting services. It claims to have sold over 30,000 machines and grossed over half a billion dollars since its launch in January 2021.

In a statement by its new co-CEOs Paul Gosker and Thomas Heller, the company said the changes would allow it to stay agile in an ever-evolving market. In addition to the layoffs, it will also slash the salaries of its senior employees and executive team by 50%.

Compass Mining is the latest in a long list of digital asset companies that have announced layoffs this year. With the bear market biting hard, many companies have been forced to reduce their staff as profitability took a nosedive. Exchanges and digital asset lenders have been the most hit as their businesses were modeled around a market that’s always going up, with the likes of Coinbase (NASDAQ: COIN), Crypto.com, BlockFi, and more all announcing layoffs. Some like Celsius and Voyager have gone bust. 

And just like many others, Compass Mining stated that it was a victim of growing too aggressively. 

“However, like many companies, we grew too quickly. When we launched, we were amazed by the level of demand for our services, and as a result, we tried to address the operational, financial, and technology bottlenecks faced by all growing companies by hiring more people,” the co-CEOs stated.

As CoinGeek reported recently, Compass Mining has been hit by several scandals lately. Its latest revolved around an alleged failure to pay its utility bills and monthly hosting fees owed to Dynamic Mining. 

Effective June 14th @compass_mining facility hosting agreement in Maine was terminated by @dynamics2k for failure to pay power consumption charges. 6 late payment and 3 non payments. @MiningScandals pic.twitter.com/cSfnWMmqTY

— DynamicsMining (@DynamicsMining) June 27, 2022

Compass denied the allegations and accused Dynamic of “misunderstanding the contracts that it signed with respect to its facilities and its obligations thereunder.”

However, shortly after, its CEO and CFO, Whit Gibbs and Jodie Fisher, resigned, with former CTO Gosker and former Chief Mining Officer Heller appointed as co-CEOs by the board of directors. 

“These changes are being implemented to achieve the next level of growth for Compass Mining,” the firm stated in its announcement.

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