Bhutan: State Bitcoin Mining in the Himalayas

Short answer: Bhutan has been mining bitcoin with its own hydropower since around 2019. The operator is the state holding company Druk Holding & Investments (DHI), working with the mining company Bitdeer since 2023. At the end of 2024, blockchain analysis put the country's holdings at around 13’000 BTC. Since then it has sold almost all of them and spent the money at home; according to trackers, around 518 BTC remain (as of Sep 15, 2026).

Bhutan is a small kingdom between India and China with just under 800’000 inhabitants. It is known for "Gross National Happiness" and for its forests. Many are surprised that this very country at times held more bitcoin than almost any other state. The reason is simple: Bhutan has plenty of electricity from hydropower, and bitcoin mining is a buyer that can sit anywhere in the world. For an overview of all countries holding bitcoin, see Countries with bitcoin reserves. This article is only about Bhutan.

Who mines bitcoin in Bhutan: Druk Holding & Investments

Druk Holding & Investments, DHI for short, is Bhutan's state holding company. It was founded in 2007 and belongs to the state through the Ministry of Finance. DHI holds the country's large state-owned companies, among them Druk Green Power, the operator of the hydropower plants.

So the power producer and the miner sit under one roof. The state fund doesn't have to buy electricity on the market; it uses power from its own plants. That makes Bhutan's mining a true state project, not a private company that the state merely taxes.

How the mining came to light

Bhutan never announced that it mines bitcoin. The public learned about it in 2023 from court documents: in the bankruptcy proceedings of the crypto lenders BlockFi and Celsius, DHI appeared as a customer that had placed crypto assets with them. Asked by journalists, DHI confirmed that it had been mining bitcoin for several years, starting at a time when one bitcoin cost around $5’000. That fits the years 2019 and 2020.

So the mining was a quiet project for several years. Only afterwards did DHI speak more openly and present it as part of its strategy to broaden the country's economy.

Why hydropower and mining fit together

Bhutan's rivers come from the Himalayas and drop steeply over short distances. The country therefore generates almost all its electricity from hydropower and produces more than it uses itself. The surplus goes mainly to India. Electricity is one of Bhutan's most important exports.

This very surplus suits mining. Three reasons:

1. The power is already there. Hydropower plants run at low operating costs. Every kilowatt hour that finds no buyer is lost.
2. Mining needs no power line abroad. Exporting electricity needs lines and a buyer who has a say in the price. Bitcoin is sold on a global market, around the clock.
3. Mining can be throttled. A mining site can switch off machines when the country needs the power itself. That matters for hydropower, because it depends heavily on the season.

The last point is Bhutan's biggest weakness. In summer, when the monsoon and snowmelt fill the rivers, there is plenty of power. In the dry winter, generation drops so far that Bhutan at times has to import electricity from India. Then mining competes directly with households and industry. A miner that can only run at full power in summer earns considerably less over the year than one with power around the clock.

How much electricity bitcoin uses overall and why miners deliberately go to surplus power is explained in Bitcoin energy consumption: facts instead of headlines. The technology of mining itself is described in Bitcoin mining explained.

Whether a machine makes a profit at a given electricity price, you can check yourself with the mining calculator:

The partnership with Bitdeer

In May 2023, DHI and Bitdeer announced a cooperation. Bitdeer is a large mining company based in Singapore, listed on Nasdaq and founded by Jihan Wu, one of the founders of the mining hardware maker Bitmain. The two partners planned a fund of up to $500 million to build mining powered by renewable energy in Bhutan.

The division of labour is simple:

Since then Bitdeer has run its own sites in Bhutan, including in Gedu and Jigmeling, and lists them in its reports to the securities regulator. For Bitdeer, Bhutan is one of its most important locations. For Bhutan, it is the largest foreign investment in mining.

How many bitcoin does Bhutan have?

There is no official figure. Bhutan publishes neither its addresses nor a balance. The known figures come from firms that analyse the blockchain, above all Arkham Intelligence. They track freshly mined bitcoin from mining addresses attributed to Bhutan and watch where they flow next.

Source: estimates by Arkham and bitcointreasuries.net based on wallet analysis. Bhutan has not confirmed the figures.

With around 13’000 BTC, Bhutan was one of the largest state holders in the world at the end of 2024, ahead of El Salvador. Measured against the country's small economy, that was a considerable share of national income.

Why Bhutan sells its bitcoin

For Bhutan, bitcoin was never meant as an eternal reserve. Mining is a source of income: power in, bitcoin out, bitcoin exchanged for money when the country needs it. Since 2024 Bhutan has taken that last step on a large scale.

The country has solid reasons. Bhutan is small, depends heavily on India and on tourism, and has been losing many young, well-educated people abroad for years. The government raised civil service salaries significantly in 2023 to slow this emigration, and has used income from the bitcoin business for spending at home. On top comes the large project Gelephu Mindfulness City, a special economic zone in the south of the country that the king is driving forward and that needs a lot of money.

From the point of view of a state budget, that makes sense. A state with scarce foreign currency and large plans needs money it can spend today. For Bhutan, bitcoin was a way to turn water into foreign currency.

For long-term holders the calculation looks different. Selling bitcoin at around €60’000 means giving up any later rise. Saxony had the same experience in 2024: the 50’000 BTC it sold would be worth around €514 million more today, as the article Countries with bitcoin reserves works out. But whether a sale was right can only be judged by its purpose, not by the price alone.

Bhutan and El Salvador compared

Both countries are small, both bet on bitcoin early. But their paths are almost opposite.

The decisive difference is the price the country pays. El Salvador buys with dollars from the state budget and bears the full price risk. Bhutan "pays" with electricity it would otherwise have exported cheaply. If the price falls, Bhutan earns less; but apart from the cost of machines and operation, it doesn't lose money it put in beforehand.

More on El Salvador's path, from the bitcoin law to the agreement with the International Monetary Fund, is in the article El Salvador: the first country with bitcoin as legal tender.

Rule of thumb: El Salvador collects bitcoin, Bhutan produces and sells them. One is a saver, the other a producer.

What you can take from Bhutan's path

Bhutan shows two things. First: bitcoin is a way to turn energy into money where no one else would buy it. That holds for a Himalayan state just as for a solar park with too much power at midday. Second: whoever produces bitcoin is not automatically a holder. Miners sell because they have bills to pay.

For you as a saver, the second point matters more. Most miners, state or company, sell a large part of their bitcoin continuously. That is a normal part of supply, not a warning sign. In the long run, the price is set by whether demand keeps growing for an asset with at most 21 million units, not by whether a small country reduces its holdings.