TeraWulf Inc (WULF) Risk Analysis

In the ordinary course of business, we aim to continuously enter into agreements with customers pursuant to which we provide data center space, power, environmental controls, physical security and connectivity products to our HPC hosting and colocation customers. These contracts typically contain indemnification and liability provisions, in addition to service level commitments, which could potentially impose a significant cost on us in the event of losses arising out of certain breaches of such agreements, services to be provided by us or our subcontractors or from third-party claims. HPC data center customers increasingly are looking to pass through their regulatory obligations and other liabilities to their outsourced data center providers and we may not be able to limit our liability or damages in an event of loss suffered by such customers whether as a result of our breach of an agreement or otherwise. If such an event of loss occurred, we could be liable for material monetary damages and could incur significant legal fees in defending against such an action, which could adversely affect our financial condition and results of operations. We may also develop space specifically for HPC data center customers pursuant to agreements signed prior to beginning or early in the development process. In those cases, if we fail to meet our development obligations under those agreements, these customers may be able to terminate their agreements and we would be required to find a new customer for this space. In addition, in certain circumstances we may lease HPC data center facilities prior to their completion. If we fail to complete the facilities in a timely manner, the customer may be entitled to terminate its agreement, seek damages or penalties against us or pursue other remedies and we may be required to find a new customer for the space. If we are not able to complete an HPC data center in a timely manner, if development costs are higher than we currently estimate, our financial condition, results of operations and cash flow could be materially adversely affected. Additionally, a customer's decision to lease space and power in our HPC data center typically involves a significant commitment of resources and due diligence on the part of our customers regarding the adequacy of our facilities. As a result, we may expend significant time and resources in pursuing a particular transaction that may not result in revenue. Economic conditions, including market downturns and the implementation of new tariffs and more restrictive trade regulations may impact customers' ability to plan future business activities, which could cause customers to slow spending or delay decision-making. Our inability to adequately manage the risks associated with these developments may adversely affect our business, financial condition and results of operations.

Current guidance from the Internal Revenue Service indicates that digital assets such as bitcoin should be treated and taxed as property and that transactions involving the payment of bitcoin for goods and services should be treated as barter transactions. While this treatment creates a potential tax reporting requirement for any circumstance where the ownership of a bitcoin passes from one person to another, usually by means of bitcoin transactions (including off-blockchain transactions), it would also apply capital gains treatment to those transactions which may adversely affect the Company's business, financial condition and results of operations.

We have invested substantial capital in acquiring miners using ASIC chips designed specifically to mine bitcoin using the 256-bit secure hashing algorithm ("SHA-256") as efficiently and as rapidly as possible on our assumption that we will be able to use them to mine bitcoin and generate revenue from our operations. Therefore, our bitcoin mining operations focus exclusively on mining bitcoin, and our bitcoin mining revenue is based on the value of the bitcoin we mine. Accordingly, if the value of bitcoin declines and fails to recover, for example, because of the development and acceptance of competing blockchain platforms or technologies, including competing cryptocurrencies which our miners may not be able to mine, the revenue we generate from our bitcoin mining operations will likewise decline. Moreover, because our miners use these highly specialized ASIC chips, we may not be able to successfully repurpose them in a timely manner, if at all, to other uses, following a sustained decline in bitcoin's value or if the bitcoin blockchain stops using SHA-256 for solving blocks. This would result in a material adverse effect on our business and could potentially impact our ability to continue as a going concern.

Our success depends, in large part, on our ability to hire, retain and motivate talented officers, leadership, and professionals. We cannot guarantee that such employees will be retained which may inhibit our management functions, strategic development, and other critical functions. Our growth may be constrained by human capital resource limitations as we compete with other companies for skilled employees. We will need to take strategic action to develop our pool of management and skilled employees as well as grow such pool to meet the demands of our corporate functions. If we are not able to do so, our business, and thus our ability to grow, may be materially adversely affected.

As the adoption of bitcoin has increased, the price of bitcoin has generally appreciated, causing the demand for new bitcoin rewards for successfully solving blocks on the bitcoin blockchain to likewise increase. This has encouraged more miners to attempt to mine bitcoin, which increases the global network hash rate deployed in support of the bitcoin blockchain. Because a miner's relative chance of successfully solving a block and earning a new bitcoin reward is generally a function of the ratio of the miner's individual hash rate relative to the global network hash rate, as the global network hash rate increases, a miner must increase its individual hash rate to maintain its chances of earning new bitcoin rewards. Therefore, as new miners enter the industry and as miners deploy greater numbers of increasingly powerful machines, existing miners must seek to continually increase their hash rate to remain competitive. Thus, a feedback loop is created: as bitcoin gains popularity and its relative market price increases, more miners attempt to mine bitcoin and the bitcoin network hash rate is increased; in response, existing miners and new miners devote more and more hash rate to the bitcoin blockchain by deploying greater numbers of increasingly powerful machines in an attempt to ensure their ability to earn additional bitcoin rewards does not decrease. Compounding this feedback loop, the network difficulty of the bitcoin network (i.e., the amount of work (measured in hashes) necessary to solve a block) is periodically adjusted to maintain the pace of new block additions (with one new block added to the blockchain approximately every ten minutes), and thereby control the supply of bitcoin. As miners deploy more hash rate and the bitcoin network hash rate is increased, the bitcoin network difficulty is adjusted upwards by requiring more hash rate to be deployed to solve a block. Thus, miners are further incentivized to grow their hash rate to maintain their chance of earning new bitcoin rewards. In theory, these dual processes should continually replicate themselves until the supply of available bitcoin is exhausted. In response, miners have attempted to achieve greater hash rate by deploying increasingly sophisticated and expensive miners in ever greater quantities. Moreover, because there are very few manufacturers of miners capable of producing a sufficient number of miners of adequate quality to meet this need, scarcity results, leading to higher prices. Compounding this phenomenon, it has been observed that some manufacturers of bitcoin miners may increase the prices for new miners as the market price of bitcoin increases. Accordingly, to maintain our chances of earning new bitcoin rewards and remaining competitive in our industry, we must seek to continually add new miners to grow our hash rate at pace with the growth in the bitcoin global network hash rate. However, as demand has increased and scarcity in the supply of new miners has resulted, the price of new miners has increased sharply, and we expect this process to continue in the future as demand for bitcoin increases. Therefore, if the price of bitcoin is not sufficiently high to allow us to fund our hash rate growth through new miner acquisitions and if we are otherwise unable to access additional capital to acquire these miners, our hash rate may stagnate and we may fall behind our competitors. If this happens, our chances of earning new bitcoin rewards would decline and, as such, our results of operations and financial condition may suffer.

Many factors, including global economic conditions, may cause our HPC data center customers to experience a downturn in their businesses or otherwise experience a lack of liquidity, which may weaken their financial condition and impact our estimates as to the probability of collectability of payments, and ultimately result in their failure to make timely rental and other payments or their default under their agreements with us. Further, the development of new technologies, the adoption of new industry standards or other factors could render our HPC data center customers' current products and services obsolete or unmarketable and contribute to a downturn in their businesses, thereby increasing the likelihood that they default under their leases, become insolvent or file for bankruptcy. If a customer defaults or fails to make timely rent or other payments, we may experience delays in enforcing our rights as landlord and may incur substantial costs in protecting our investment, which could adversely affect our financial condition and results of operations. If a customer becomes a debtor in a case under the U.S. Bankruptcy Code, we cannot evict the customer solely because of the bankruptcy. In addition, the bankruptcy court might authorize the customer to reject and terminate its contracts with us. Our claim against the customer for unpaid, future rent and other payments would be subject to a statutory cap that might be substantially less than the remaining amounts actually owed under their agreements with us. In either case, our claim for unpaid rent and other amounts would likely not be paid in full. Our revenue could be materially adversely affected if a significant customer were to become bankrupt or insolvent, suffer a downturn in its businesses, fail to renew its contract or renew on terms less favorable to us than its current terms.

As a publicly traded company, at times we experience cyber-attacks, such as phishing, and other attempts to gain unauthorized access to our systems, and we anticipate continuing to be subject to such attempts. There is an ongoing risk that some or all of our bitcoin could be lost or stolen as a result of one or more of these incursions. As we increase in size, we may become a more appealing target of hackers, malware, cyber-attacks or other security threats, and, despite our implementation of strict security measures, it is impossible to eliminate all such vulnerability. For instance, we may not be able to ensure the adequacy of the security measures employed by third parties, such as our service providers. Additionally, though we provide cybersecurity training for all employees, we cannot guarantee that we will not be affected by further phishing attempts. Efforts to limit the ability of malicious actors to disrupt the operations of the internet or undermine our own security efforts may be costly to implement and may not be successful. Such breaches, whether attributable to a vulnerability in our systems or otherwise, could result in claims of liability against us, damage our reputation and materially harm our business. We rely on the well-known U.S. based third-party digital asset-focused custodian, NYDIG, to safeguard our bitcoin using cold storage. NYDIG receives and holds our custodied assets, which includes both our digital assets and any cash we may choose to custody with NYDIG. Only NYDIG holds the private keys to our wallet, and no one at the Company has access to our wallet's private keys. If our third-party service provider experiences a security breach or cyber-attack and unauthorized parties obtain access to our bitcoin, we may lose some or all of our bitcoin and our financial condition and results of operations could be materially adversely affected. To date, we have not experienced a material cyber incident; however, we continue to encounter ongoing cyber-attacks and the occurrence of any such event in the future could subject us to liability to our customers, suppliers, business partners and others, or give rise to legal and/or regulatory action, which could damage our reputation or otherwise materially harm our business, operating results, and financial condition. However, pursuant to our Digital Asset Custodial Agreement, dated as of March 10, 2022, between us and NYDIG (as may be amended, modified or supplemented from time to time, the "Custodial Agreement"), NYDIG has covenanted that it holds our digital assets in a segregated account that will at all times be identifiable in NYDIG's database as being stored for our benefit; that NYDIG has no right, interest or title in our digital assets; and that our digital assets do not constitute an asset on the balance sheet of NYDIG. To the extent NYDIG holds any cash on our behalf, NYDIG may hold our cash in one or more omnibus "for benefit of customers" accounts at one or more U.S. insured depository institutions. However, at this time, the Company has no cash custodied, and has no immediate or future plans to custody, any cash with NYDIG. Furthermore, NYDIG has covenanted that our digital assets will not be commingled with other digital assets held by NYDIG, except temporarily (typically for no longer than 12 hours, but in no case longer than 72 hours) as an operational matter, if required, to effect a transfer into or out of our digital asset account. Significantly, NYDIG represents and warrants that beneficial and legal ownership of all our digital assets is, and will remain, freely transferable without the payment of money or value and that NYDIG has no ownership interest in our account. While we believe that the Custodial Agreement provides our business with reasonable protections for our business's operations and the safe storage of our digital assets, we make no assurances that storing our digital assets with NYDIG is free from risk, given the various risks enumerated above. To the best of our knowledge, NYDIG safely stores our digital assets in segregated accounts as represented in the Custodial Agreement; however, if NYDIG were to be in breach of the Custodial Agreement, our digital assets could be compromised. Additionally, if NYDIG were to cease operations, declare insolvency or file for bankruptcy, there is a reasonable risk that recovery of our assets, though kept in segregated accounts, would be delayed or unrecoverable. Additionally, if NYDIG were to cease operations, declare insolvency or file for bankruptcy, we do not have a readily available backup custodian at this time, and so we would need to self-custody our digital assets using cold storage until we could contract with another adequate custodian for the safe storage of our assets which may have a disruptive effect on our business. In the meantime, our mined bitcoin would continue to aggregate in our proprietary wallet until we found a suitable cold storage custodian.

We are subject to price volatility and uncertainty due to geopolitical crises and economic downturns. Such geopolitical crises and global economic downturns may be a result of invasion, or possible invasion by one nation of another, global outbreaks of various epidemics or disease, the implementation of new tariffs and more restrictive trade regulations, leading to increased inflation and supply chain volatility. Such crises will likely continue to have an effect on our ability to do business in a cost-effective manner. Inflation has caused the price of materials to increase leading to increased expenses to our business. Global crises and economic downturns may also have the effect of discouraging investment in bitcoin as investors shift their investments to less volatile assets. Such shifts could have a materially adverse effect on our business, operations and the value of the bitcoin we mine. Sustaining our growth plans will require the ongoing readiness and solvency of our suppliers and vendors, a stable and motivated production workforce, and government cooperation, each of which may be affected by macroeconomic factors outside of our immediate control. We cannot predict the duration or direction of current or new global trends or their sustained impact. Ultimately, we continue to monitor macroeconomic conditions to remain flexible and to optimize and evolve our business as appropriate, and we will have to accurately project demand and infrastructure requirements globally and deploy our workforce and capital resources accordingly. If we experience unfavorable global market conditions, or if we cannot or do not maintain operations at a scope that is commensurate with such conditions or are later required to or choose to suspend such operations, our business, prospects, financial condition, and operating results may be harmed.