SBI Crypto has announced it will shut down its Bitcoin mining pool on July 31, ending a service tied to one of Japan’s largest financial groups and giving miners less than a month to redirect their hashrate.
Miners face July 31 cutoff
The pool will stop accepting mining shares, which represent a miner’s contributions in the pool, on the cutoff date.
Shares submitted after that point will not be accepted, and the firm said the pool is expected to operate normally until the shutdown date.
The company urged customers to keep mining with the pool until the cutoff so eligible shares are included in the final payout calculation.
A significant slice of the network
SBI Crypto’s mining pool accounts for roughly 2% of the Bitcoin network’s total hashrate, according to data from Hashrateindex.
The firm did not disclose a reason for the closure in its shutdown notice, nor did it provide current hashrate figures for the pool.
SBI Crypto operates under SBI Group, the Japanese financial conglomerate. The pool opened to the public in 2021, with SBI saying at the time it would support the operation with roughly 1.1 EH/s of its own mining power.
Pressure on miners builds
The shutdown comes as bitcoin mining remains under pressure from lower margins, volatile hashrate and rising operational costs.
Hashrate has been falling from its October high as bitcoin’s price drops and some miners pivot to AI infrastructure. Bitcoin’s price has fallen 50% over the past year from its fall all-time high.
SBI Crypto was also linked to a reported $21 million hack last year, with blockchain investigator ZachXBT pointing to signs similar to North Korean state-backed attacks. The shutdown notice does not cite the incident as a reason for closing.
