Jack Dorsey-Backed Bitcoin Miner ‘Ocean’ Moves Headquarters to El Salvador

Ocean Mining, a Bitcoin mining pool backed by Block head Jack Dorsey, has established its global headquarters in El Salvador. The country’s pro-crypto policies are what attracted this crypto mining pool to move there. Crypto mining operations are known to be very power intensive, which has led to several nations discouraging and even banning these businesses. For Ocean, El Salvador has emerged as the top choice of location to set up its global headquarters — it became the first country in the world to legalise Bitcoin as a legal tender in 2021.

Ocean Mining to Move Headquarters to El Salvador

Founded in Wyoming, Ocean Mining closed a $6.2 million (roughly Rs. 51 crore) funding round led by Dorsey In December 2023. In the coming months, Ocean plans to bring awareness and training programmes around Bitcoin to the Salvadoran citizens.

“With places like Venezuela and the EU imposing legislation to ban Bitcoin mining, El Salvador’s political stance was in stark contrast and a beacon of hope for the industry. To further our decentralisation efforts, we needed a global presence, and El Salvador was the obvious choice,” Ocean Mining President Mark Artymko said in a prepared statement. .

The company says that it is looking to bring decentralisation to the crypto mining sector. In the wider picture, Ocean claims, it is looking to help crypto miners take control of their operations.

“For us it is about shifting the balance of power away from a handful of pools and bringing miners of all sizes closer to the nucleus of Bitcoin. Bringing these features to market from our new global hub in El Salvador will ensure maximum reach and adoption in a safe regulatory environment,” said Ocean’s Global Head of Sales, a person known as ‘Bitcoin Mechanic’.

Along with its pro-Bitcoin policies, Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele is also working on creating a ‘Bitcoin City’ where operations and businesses related to the cryptocurrency could work and harness power from volcanic energy to conduct mining operations.

Last month, Dorsey-led payments firm Block announced the creation of its Bitcoin mining chip that is aimed at decentralising the supply of Bitcoin mining hardware.

Moving forward, Block has decided to design a full Bitcoin mining system based on the feedback it has received from the community of miners. Dorsey wishes to address challenges related to pre-sale discovery, purchasing, reliability on mining hardware, maintenance of machines, as well as post-sale support.

On a global level, the market cap of the crypto mining sector is projected to grow to $5.55 billion (roughly Rs. 46,274 crore) by 2031, growing at a CAGR of 12 percent in the forecast period (2024-2031), according to a report by market intelligence firm SkyQuest.