Bitcoin mining pool Poolin officially filed for bankruptcy, with liabilities of approximately $173.1 million

Mars Finance news: On July 25, Singapore Poolin Technology Pte. Ltd. and its two U.S. subsidiaries Lonestar Dream and Lonestar Taproot filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on July 22 with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in New Jersey, becoming one of the most significant institutional collapses in the mining sector in recent years.

Court documents show Poolin’s liabilities range from $100 million to $500 million, with the specific figure at about $173.1 million, while assets are less than $10 million. The number of creditors is between 10 thousand and 25 thousand.

Among them, the largest single debt is about $163.7 million, involving approximately 11,700 “Poolin Wallet” wallet users. The root of this debt can be traced back to September 2022, when the crypto market crash hit. Poolin liquidated user-asset loans after they were margin-called, then froze wallets and restricted withdrawals, claiming “facing liquidity issues.” It then used IOU promissory-note tokens instead of repaying users’ real Bitcoin. For three years, this debt has never been repaid.

Poolin was founded in 2017 in Beijing by veterans from Bitmain, including Kevin Pan and Fa Zhu. At its peak in 2019, it once controlled roughly 18%-20% of network hashrate, making it one of the largest Bitcoin mining pools in the world at the time. After the mining ban in 2021, the company moved its business to Texas in the U.S., but due to a severe shortfall in its power quota application (originally expected 600 megawatts, but only approved 100 megawatts), it was forced to sell idle equipment at low prices. Between 2023 and 2025, this caused losses of about $8.8 million. The Texas business’s cumulative losses totaled nearly $45.9 million. It was shut down completely on July 10 and confirmed it will not restart.

At present, the company’s only hope of repaying its debts is to auction its two West Texas mining site assets. Thor CALAP LLC has submitted a “anchored bid” of $52 million as the auction’s opening bid, but this amount is far from enough to cover the total liabilities of $173.1 million, and creditors are expected to receive only partial repayment.