Key takeaways
- Parasite Pool mined block 945,601 on April 18, its second block in 14 months, running 52 petahashes per second
- ZK Shark's hybrid model pays 1 bitcoin to the block finder and distributes remaining rewards proportionally with no pool fees
- Retained hashrate through a 48-day dry spell between blocks, giving the hybrid payout design two validation rounds
Second Block Gives the Model Real Proof
On April 18, 2026, Parasite Pool mined block 945,601, its second successful block since launching in April 2025 and roughly 48 days after its first at block 938,713 in late February. That block carried 7,398 transactions and 0.002 bitcoin in fees, arriving while bitcoin traded at $76,213. At the time of the find, the pool was running just 52 petahashes per second (PH/s), or roughly 0.005% of Bitcoin's estimated one-zetahash network hashrate.
One block could be luck. Two blocks, with hashrate retained through a 48-day silence, is a data point. Parasite's hybrid payout design now has two live block events to evaluate.
The Payout Model Explained
Parasite Pool operates on a split no other pool at this scale has attempted. A winning miner receives 1 bitcoin outright as a finder's fee. The remaining 2.125 bitcoin, plus transaction fees, is distributed proportionally among all participants based on shares submitted since the last block. There are no pool fees, and payouts route through the Lightning Network (LN).
Founded by ZK Shark, Parasite sits inside the Ordinals orbit. Blocks it mines tend to carry inscription and data-carrier transactions, a detail that has not gone unnoticed in Bitcoin-only communities.
What This Model Solves
The psychological dimension of home mining is rarely discussed in the economics literature, but it matters for adoption. Home miners do not just run hardware for the yield. They run it for the possibility of the payout, the tangible proof of contributing to the network's security, and the chance at becoming a whole-coiner through their own work rather than through an exchange or ETF.
Traditional large-pool payouts are steady but small. A home miner pointing modest hardware at a major pool might accumulate 0.02 bitcoin per year at current difficulty. Pure solo pools like CKPool preserve a lottery payout but not hope: the odds of a 52 PH/s miner finding a block solo run into the tens of thousands of years on average. Most home miners who go solo watch the countdown tick without a payout and eventually quit.
Parasite splits the difference. The 1 bitcoin finder's fee keeps the lottery alive. Proportional distribution of the remainder keeps satoshis flowing between blocks. Peak hashrate hit 182 PH/s in June 2025 before declining to its current 52 PH/s. A smaller pool means longer expected gaps between blocks, which tests the model more severely. Two 1-bitcoin finder payouts in 14 months are the clearest evidence yet that the design can retain miners through dry spells.
Why It Matters
Traditional pools flatten the upside. Solo mining kills hope. Industrial mining is a race to the bottom on energy and capital that cuts ordinary home miners out of the story entirely. Parasite Pool's answer is structural: keep the lottery alive with a 1 bitcoin finder's fee, keep miners solvent between blocks by splitting the rest. Two blocks in 14 months, through a 48-day dry spell, with hashrate intact, suggests the design is not a gimmick. The question it forces is the right one: should every bitcoin mined come from a warehouse farm, or should the plebs eat first?
