Binance's mining pool exit can add less than one point to the top three pools' 64%

Take the ceiling first. If every miner still pointed at Binance moved to Foundry USA, AntPool or F2Pool, their combined share would reach roughly 65%, assuming the rest of the network stays unchanged ^[9], from 64.2% in Hashrate Index's latest table ^[8], a gain of about 0.8 points ^[17]. Miners can also redirect to smaller providers ^[10], and each one that does leaves the top three with less than that. We think the closure is a minor event for block production on those numbers, and we would revise that if the first table after the cutoff puts the top three well above 65%, because Binance's remaining miners cannot account for more.

Most of the pool's hashrate has already left. Hashrate Index estimated the pool at 26 EH/s in December ^[2] and now puts it at about 9.2 ^[3], so 16.8 EH/s is gone ^[15]. Over the same months the top three's combined share rose from 61.4% to 64.2% ^[8], or 2.8 points ^[16], although the comparison is loose because ViaBTC held third place in December and F2Pool holds it now ^[8]. Set against that rise, the 0.8-point ceiling is about 29% of it ^[18].

In Hashrate Index's December report, Binance Pool was the only pool still running from the years when exchanges branched into mining ^[14]. Binance cited an ongoing review of its products and services ^[1]. Under FPPS the pool paid miners for their work and took the risk that it found fewer blocks than expected ^[11], and once Binance stops crediting shares on Nov. 10 ^[4] we would expect that exposure to end with the product.

Four years ago Binance was offering to fund miners' growth: in October 2022 it unveiled a $500 million program for lending to miners via the pool, with secured loans of 18 to 24 months at interest rates of 5% to 10% ^[6]. A loan written on the day of the announcement would have come due by October 2024 ^[19]. The closure notice does not address the program or disclose any outstanding loan balance ^[7].