- A lone Bitcoin miner has achieved a rare feat by earning a $156,800 reward for producing a Bitcoin block, defying the 4% odds.
- Bitcoin mining, once accessible to laptops, has evolved into a billion-dollar industry, with miners globally competing to validate transactions.
- This accomplishment should mathematically happen once every seven years
A lone Bitcoin miner has beaten the odds to earn a $156,800 payday by being chosen to produce a Bitcoin block. The solo operator, mining through the Solo CKpool service, saw off competition from a plethora of mining giants on August 18 to pick up the ₿6.25 reward, which carries a likelihood of approximately 4%. This is the same as drawing an ace from a pack of playing cards. This is only the third time in recent years that such an event has taken place, with one of the prior two occasions in 2022 also coming through the Solo CKpool mining pool, showing that such wins are still possible in an industry dominated by major players.
Luck of the Draw
Initially, Bitcoin mining was accessible to anyone using a laptop, but as competition intensified, it evolved into a billion-dollar industry. Today, miners from across the globe compete to solve intricate mathematical puzzles, vying for the opportunity to add blocks to the blockchain, thereby validating transactions.
Such companies spent tens of millions of dollars on their setups and operational costs, which is why tales of lone miners getting the block reward are now so rare. 2022 saw two such occasions in quick succession, one of which was also through the Solo CKpool but these are the only ones in recent years.
Not for the Faint-hearted
Con Kolivas, who oversees the Solo CKpool, congratulated the winner on X, hinting that the miner had been operating with just 1 PH/s (petahash per second). This, he said, would mathematically allow the miner to win the Bitcoin mining lottery once every seven years:
Congratulations to miner bc1q2za4ejga366sn288273pty8trasn5zs4y9hqg6 with ~1PH of hashrate at solving the 277th solo block at https://t.co/UWgBvLkDqc! A miner of this size would only solve a block solo on average once every 7 years at current diffhttps://t.co/cNgm1KUqvw
— Dr. Con Kolivas (@ckpooldev) August 19, 2023
It’s unlikely that such tales will encourage others to take up Bitcoin mining as a hobby, unless they happen to live next to a free or dirt cheap source of energy and are prepared to be very, very patient.
