14 and 9-year-old siblings from Texas reportedly make $32,000 a month mining cryptocurrency

Up until this year, 14-year-old Ishaan Thakur and his little sister, Aanya, 9, used to spend their summers running a lemonade stand to save up for their college fund and made about $100 in total. This year, the duo from Frisco, Texas, decided to try their hand at a much more lucrative business: mining cryptocurrency. "We started because we wanted to learn something new about technology – and also make some money along the way," Ishaan told CNBC Make It. He revealed that they now make over $30,000 every month by mining three digital coins: Bitcoin, the largest cryptocurrency by market value; ether, the second-largest; and ravencoin, an altcoin amid the top 100.

According to The Dallas Morning News, it all began in February when their father — a former investment banker — told them about bitcoin prices spiking to over $50,000. "We wanted to invest in it, but we didn't have the money to buy bitcoin," Ishaan said. "So instead, we bought the equipment to mine for it instead." Ishaan and Aanya also had to learn how to mine, which involves programming complex computers "to compete to solve difficult puzzles in order to validate transactions."

"Crypto mining is just like mining for gold or diamonds," the teen explained. "Instead of using shovels, you mine with computers. Instead of finding a piece of gold or a diamond in the mine, you find a cryptocurrency." The siblings began mining in March with an old gaming computer, making $1,000 in their first month. Since then, their earnings have shot up to $32,000 a month. "I thought I wouldn't be able to do it because it's too high-level, but we watched YouTube videos and my dad and sister helped," said Ishaan, a ninth-grader at Frisco High School.

"We could have spent the entire summer playing video games, but instead we used our spare time to learn about technology," he added. Ishaan and Aanya, a fourth-grader at Spears Elementary, made their business venture official on April 30 by creating their own mining company named Flifer Technologies. They currently have over 97 processors, which their father Manish Raj helped fund by taking out a loan. The siblings revealed that they use "100% renewable energy for our mining," because "we want to be environmentally friendly." They also rent a data center in Dallas.

"We moved from my desk to the garage, since the house was getting too much heat and noise. [W]e outgrew the garage since heat and noise was too much for the garage too," Ishaan said. "We now use the garage only for building and testing mining rigs. When they are ready, we move them to a professional, air-conditioned data center in downtown Dallas." The Thakurs hope their profits will help them pay for college as both hope to become doctors. While Ishaan has his sights set on the University of Pennsylvania, Aanya would like to attend New York University.

While some investors are wary of cryptocurrencies due to their volatility, the brother-sister duo said they don't have concerns about finding a buyer for their Ethereum when the time comes to pay for college since the market is very good. Ishaan revealed that he tries to keep up with news on the cryptocurrency world. But neither he nor Aanya have told their friends about their lucrative summer project. "Most kids like to play games on their computer," said Ishaan. "We like to build them, I guess."