On Thursday, a solo bitcoin miner, operating at approximately 230 terahashes per second, successfully validated block 943,411, earning a reward of 3.139 BTC, valued at around $210,000. Notably, this miner's share of the total network hashrate is so minimal that it is nearly undetectable on most dashboards. The miner was connected to solo.ckpool.org, a solo mining pool that has been in operation since 2014 and allows operators to retain their full block rewards, minus a 2% fee. Con Kolivas, the developer of CKpool, confirmed the win on social media, highlighting that the miner had a mere 1-in-28,000 chance of finding a block on any given day.
The winning miner, bc1qtt7cr9cxykyp9g4hq47zf5lq9t97cxvq72lun3, achieved this feat with a relatively modest setup of approximately 230 terahashes, equivalent to about 0.00002% of bitcoin's total estimated hashrate of roughly 1 zetahash per second. In comparison, listed miner Riot Platforms operates at a significantly larger scale, with over 30 exahashes, roughly 130,000 times the hashrate of the winning miner.
This solo win marks the 312th block found by CKpool since its inception and ends a 33-day drought, with solo pools having discovered just 20 bitcoin blocks in the past 12 months, distributing a combined total of 62.96 BTC. The win is part of a pattern that has been observed with surprising regularity, with similar unexpected wins occurring in December and November, where miners with relatively modest hashrates overcame significant odds to claim substantial rewards.