- El Salvador is actively working on attracting Bitcoin businesses and like-minded individuals to the country.
- Ocean Mining is relocating its operations to El Salvador.
- The firm pitches itself as a transparent mining company.
El Salvador has been actively working to reinvent itself as a Bitcoin business hub and tourist destination. Recent measures include amending tax laws in March to eliminate the 30% rate on international transfers and jailing gang members to enhance the safety of citizens and visitors.
Sponsored
These efforts appear to be paying off. Cathie Wood of Ark Invest recently predicted a tenfold increase in El Salvador’s GDP over the next five years. Riding this wave of optimism, many individuals and companies have been moving to El Salvador, with the latest firm to relocate being Bitcoin mining pool Ocean Mining.
Bitcoin Country Is Calling
A recent post by Stacy Herbert, the director of the National Bitcoin Office, confirmed that Ocean Mining is relocating its headquarters to El Salvador. Herbert added, “Every bitcoin company needs bitcoin on its balance sheet and headquarters in Bitcoin Country.”
Ocean Mining’s parent company, Bitcoin Ocean, is registered in Wyoming, U.S., but Ocean Mining will soon move to El Salvador’s capital, San Salvador, to further its mission of decentralizing BTC mining.
Commenting on the relocation, Ocean Mining co-founder and CTO Luke Dashjr stated, “El Salvador is on the leading edge of Bitcoin and Bitcoin mining adoption, and we believe OCEAN’s presence here will help to advance these efforts here and create new opportunities for El Salvador and elsewhere.”
Ocean Mining Pitches Itself as Different
As a mining pool, Ocean Mining organizes third parties to coordinate their collective hashing power to mine BTC blocks. This pooling of computational resources increases the chances of earning mining rewards and receiving a steady flow of BTC.
Sponsored
Ocean Mining claims to be different from other mining pools in that it operates a more transparent pooling setup. This enables participating miners to be paid directly from the BTC network and verify their rewards, ensuring they are not being short-changed.
Dashjr is considered a purist who believes BTC should only be used for monetary transactions. In December 2023, he advocated for the censorship of Inscriptions transactions, calling the feature network spam. This stance incited pushback from those who believe individuals should be free to use the network however they choose.
On the Flipside
- Critics maintain that Bitcoin‘s energy-intensive mining process is environmentally unsustainable and contributes to climate change.
- Ocean Mining accounts for a small proportion of the total network hash rate, at 1.3EH/s. The leading pool, Foundry USA, holds around 30% of the total hash rate, at 194 EH/s.
Why This Matters
By establishing its global headquarters in El Salvador, Ocean Mining has signaled its confidence in the country’s crypto-friendly policies and economic stability.
Argentine and Salvadoran regulators recently met, fueling rumors of potential state-level Bitcoin integration in Argentina.
Argentina on the Bitcoin Path: Can It Learn From El Salvador?
Fetch.ai, SingularityNET, and Ocean Protocol finalize merger plans to form an AI supergroup.
AI Pioneers Unite to Challenge Big Tech in $6B Merger
