Binance Launches Its Own Crypto Mining Platform

One of the largest cryptocurrency exchanges, Binance, has successfully launched its much anticipated mining pool, the firm said in a blog post on 27 April.

According to the announcement, the “Binance Pool” will initially focus on Bitcoin mining services only, but will spread out to different cryptocurrencies with time. The blog post further stated that the pool supports both PoW (Proof-of-Work) and PoS (Proof-of-Stake) mining mechanisms. The firm’s CEO, Changpeng Zhao, commented on the new service:

“As an integral part of the global crypto market, empowering miners will therein enable significant growth and scale in the larger industry. With Binance Pool, we aim to establish a comprehensive platform for miners that will bring more possibilities to the mining industry by bridging traditional mining to financial services.”

The pool has already attracted more than 35,000 active workers, generating a total hash rate of 1.8 EH/s, with its zero percent mining fees as of the time of writing. This offer, however, will be available only for the first month after the launch of the pool, after which the rate will be set at around 2.5 percent.

The “Binance Pool” will also be integrated with the firm’s ecosystem of products, which will allow miners to effortlessly transfer funds between the pool and Binance’s other platforms, such as its spot exchange, derivatives products, lending services, and more.

While some in the crypto community have expressed their concern that the Binance Pool could contribute to the centralization of the BTC hash rate among a number of pools, Binance claims that the launch of the pool “adds another player into the world of crypto mining and makes BTC hash power more decentralized”.

With the launch of the pool, Binance has joined its competitors, Huobi and OKEx, who have been offering similar services for a while now. Since their launch, both Huobi and OKEx‘s pools have joined the list of top ten mining pools.