An independent Bitcoin miner beat the odds on Monday, solving block 960,804 alone and collecting a reward of 3.157 BTC worth roughly $199,300 at current prices. The win comes just three weeks after another solo operator claimed block 957,382 for 3.1382 BTC, worth about $200,000 at the time — a reminder that individual miners can still land block rewards even as the network's hashrate has consolidated around large industrial pools.
According to CoinDesk's daily markets roundup, solo miners have now claimed 13 blocks so far this year. The identity of the hardware behind Monday's win was not disclosed, and such victories remain statistically rare against a global hashrate dominated by pooled mining operations.
Coldcard Wallet Drains Trigger a Fourth Sweep
The mining win landed alongside darker news for the Bitcoin security community. A wallet exploit affecting Coldcard hardware wallets has been linked to potential losses reaching $114 million, and on-chain data pointed to a fourth wave of coordinated sweeps against addresses generated by the affected devices on Monday. Reporting described “a possible fourth sweep” as holders rushed to move funds before attackers could drain vulnerable wallets.
The fallout is visible in exchange flow data: aggregate Bitcoin reserves held on exchanges climbed from 2.706 million BTC on July 30, when the incident first surfaced, to 2.718 million BTC by Monday, as spooked holders moved coins to trading venues. The number of unique sending addresses also spiked last Friday to levels not seen since early 2024, an indication of how widely the scare rippled through wallet holders checking their own exposure.
A Shaky Backdrop for Risk Assets
The security scare arrived as broader market conditions were already softening. Bitcoin futures yields, which had exceeded 20% at their peak, have collapsed to roughly 3% — now trailing the 3.8% yield on two-year U.S. Treasury notes, a sign that the carry trade incentive to hold leveraged BTC futures positions has largely evaporated. Rising Treasury yields and mortgage rates were cited as headwinds weighing on risk assets broadly, cryptocurrencies included.
At the time of the report, Bitcoin traded near $62,690, down 0.46% on the day, while Ethereum sat at roughly $1,844.66, XRP at $1.07 and Solana at $72.52 — all posting modest daily declines. Separately, Senate lawmakers removed the Clarity Act from Monday's legislative agenda, leaving just five scheduled session days before the chamber's August 10 summer recess begins, a delay that pushes a key piece of crypto market-structure legislation further down the calendar.
