Daunting information regarding Bitcoin\u2019s decentralization surfaced today as news emerged<\/a> that a single custodian controls the coinbase address for nine mining pools.<\/p>\n The single custodian \u2013 which experts signal is Cobo \u2013 represents 47% of the total hashrate.<\/p>\n Coinbase transactions refer to the first transaction in a block, which issues newly created bitcoin to the miner that solved the cryptographic lottery known as Proof of Work. The transaction also includes the block reward used to pay miners for securing the network \u2013 set to be cut in half in 10 days due to Bitcoin\u2019s quadrennial halving<\/a>.<\/p>\n Bitcoin fell nearly 4% $69,011, a 3.7% drop on the day. The asset has been in a tight range, trading between $66,000 and $72,000 in the past week.<\/p>\n The custodian was identified by pseudonymous developer Mononaut, who helps run mempool.space<\/a>, a visualization platform of Bitcoin\u2019s blockchain.<\/p>\n According to Mononaut, the single custodian has been consolidating mining rewards from AntPool, F2Pool, Binance Pool, Braiins, btccom, SECPOOL and Poolin.<\/p>\n Ultimately, this means that the custodian holds the keys to 47 of every 100 freshly minted Bitcoin.<\/p>\n In Dec. 2023, Mononaut had already pointed out<\/a> that over 40% of Bitcoin mining rewards were being directed to a single custodian.<\/p>\n According to the developer, the likely reason behind the consolidation is outsourcing custody and payout management for miners.<\/p>\n Some triggered the fire alarm today.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is bad because this custodian can practically UASF or URSF anything it wants,\u201d said<\/a> Francis Pouliot, founder and CEO of Bull Bitcoin, a Canadian Bitcoin exchange.<\/p>\n UASF is an abbreviation for ‘User Activated Soft Fork\u2019 and represents a mechanism in which the activation time of a blockchain soft fork is enforced by full nodes, which are commonly referred to as the economic majority.<\/p>\n Bitcoin went through a UASF in 2017, as the Blocksize War, which took place between 2015 and 2017, ended with the SegWit implementation and the continuation of 2MB blocks. The losing side, which aimed to increase Bitcoin\u2019s block size, went on to create Bitcoin Cash (BCH) and Bitcoin Satoshi\u2019s Vision (BSV).<\/p>\n However, Pouliot actually refers to a 51% attack, in which a majority of the mining hashrate colludes to strike the Bitcoin blockchain, potentially through a double spend or a transaction re-arrangement.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, others say the overall situation is somewhat inconsequential.<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t see an issue; it\u2019s pretty trivial to change custodian for a mining pool,\u201d said<\/a> Tuur Demesteer, advisor to Blockstream and long-time Bitcoin analyst.<\/p>\nOutsourcing Custody<\/h2>\n
User Activated Soft Fork?<\/h2>\n
\u201cPretty Trivial To Change Custodian\u201d<\/h2>\n
![\"Mining](\"https:\/\/thedefiant.io\/_next\/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fcdn.sanity.io%2Fimages%2F6oftkxoa%2Fproduction%2Fd21f0a071d612f08e570a173b0b88299c2138e4c-1456x749.jpg&w=828&q=100\")