This real estate investor mines more than $110,000 in bitcoin every month

He runs his private equity firm with $250 million in assets under management (according to his website), invests in real estate, worked in data science and analytics at Apple - and he started investing in bitcoin in 2013, long before it was popular to make even a passive bet on the crypto asset class.

Taing told news, "I just like making money." "I put money into a lot of things." I own several apartment buildings as well as senior living facilities. "I have GPU mines," Taing added. "I just like to look for places where I can get a good arbitrage advantage, and I thought bitcoin mining provided that, both from the standpoint of, 'Hey, I could get more bitcoin by having miners than buying bitcoin, especially at the scale that I can get into it but also that I am a big believer in bitcoin's future.'"

Bitcoin uses a proof-of-work mining model, which means that miners worldwide use high-powered computers to create new bitcoin while also validating transactions. However, the procedure necessitates costly equipment, technical know-how, and a large amount of electricity.

According to Taing, the experiment has been going well so far. Two hundred of his 261 mining rigs, including Canaan AvalonMiners, Bitmain Antminer S19 Pros, and Whatsminer M30Ss, are hosted in Nebraska and Canada by Compass. According to digital receipts he provided CNBC, they generate about 2.8 bitcoin per month, or about $111,000 total.

Taing also makes money on Compass' marketplace by buying and selling mining equipment to retail customers. They typically purchase one or two items at a time and are less price sensitive.

CNBC spoke with several Compass customers to better understand the appetite for small-scale mining as it competes with major industry players with massive operations. But, according to Compass CEO Whit Gibbs, that is precisely the point: To gain a retail market share.