Recent speculation about a solo miner striking it rich in the Bitcoin lottery was dispelled after mining marketplace NiceHash confirmed it was behind the untagged blocks that sparked the narrative. Blocks 932129 and 932167, mined earlier this week, initially appeared without a visible pool tag on mempool explorers, leading many observers to assume they were mined by an independent solo miner—a rare event that would have netted the miner the full block reward of approximately 3.157 BTC, worth around $304,814 at Bitcoin's trading price near $96,000.
In exclusive comments to Cointelegraph, Sasa Coh, CEO of NiceHash AG, clarified the misunderstanding. "The misconception here is only that the blocks were not labeled by mempool, though they were tagged with NiceHashMining," Coh said. "We did not want to stir up any speculation." He confirmed the blocks were mined during internal testing for a forthcoming product but declined to share technical details ahead of launch.
The episode highlights how Bitcoin narrative formation can quickly rely on assumptions rather than verifiable on-chain signals. Block tags are metadata, not protocol guarantees, and their absence can lead to incorrect conclusions. The excitement briefly reignited discussion around solo mining, where an individual miner works independently. While possible, it is highly unpredictable due to the probabilistic nature of mining.
Coh noted that institutional mining operations cannot rely on such chance. They employ advanced strategies to reduce variance and generate predictable revenue, especially as institutional Bitcoin mining faces increasing margin pressure post-halving. Meanwhile, separate reports confirmed that two actual solo miners did achieve rare wins this week, each mining a full block and earning roughly $300,000, underscoring that while improbable, Bitcoin's permissionless design still allows for such individual successes.
