A solo BTC miner was compensated massively for adding block number 780,122 to the oldest and the largest blockchain. According to BTC.com’s Bitcoin explorer, this miner utilized the SoloCK Pool mining service to establish a solo mining pool that produced a valid hash, which saw them receive 6.24 BTC plus another fee reward of about 0.64 BTC ($147,000).

Twitter user (@Ckpooldev) said the solo miner was very lucky to produce that valid hash, claiming it usually takes about ten months to create such a transaction with the computing power that was used. The solo miner only mined for two days.

According to Ckpooldev, this miner used a hashing power of 6.8 petahashes per second (PH/s), and when the block got added, the Bitcoin’s entire hash rate was about 308,261 PH/s. That means the solo miner’s hash rate only represented 0.00035% of the blockchain’s total computational power.

Solo Miner Reveals Themselves

On Monday morning, the account (@Pineconeeee) on Bitcoin.org, a forum for Bitcoin enthusiasts, started claiming responsibility for adding block 780,122 to the blockchain, saying they rented additional power from a platform called nicehash.

The miner revealed they were Russian. They also explained that they usually work with a computing power of about 160 terahashes per second (TH/s) but opted to rent 6 petahashes per second (PH/s) last Thursday.

The block added by the Russia-based miner had 3,222 transactions worth 16,945 BTC.

Bitcoin Miners Opt for Mining Pools

Adding a block to proof of work blockchains like Bitcoin involves miners continuously running calculations to find a valid hash for a block. Nowadays, many new blocks being added to Bitcoin are mined through mining pools, which involve several miners combining their hashing power to boost their chances of discovering a valid hash.

However, it is technically possible for a solo miner to be lucky enough once in a while and create a valid hash by themselves.

Data from BTC.com shows the biggest mining pool worldwide is Foundry USA. This mining pool makes up 35% of the total hash rate on the Bitcoin blockchain. Its hash rate is about 106 exahashes per second (EH/s), making it more powerful when compared to the solo miner’s.