The Bitcoin Foundation on Thursday received 146 BTC ($65,000) from BitClub after half of the proceeds from bitcoin transaction was sent as a fee, given by the recipient mining pool.
The bitcoin mining pool BitClub, which claims to operate two mining locations in Iceland sent a fee of 291 BTC (then $136,000) on 27th April,2016 to the foundation, as a part of block 409,008 on the network. The transaction managed to draw industry attention and on social media due to its notable size. The average transaction fee at the time was 31 satoshis or less than $0.01.
Following this, BitClub in its mail issued a public call that it is willing to return the fee, should the user come forward and identify themselves. Bit Club announced that if no users step forward, it would seek to donate the funds with one of the possible recipients being Bitcoin Foundation.
In its mail, BitClub wrote that, “ We are currently waiting for someone to reach out to us and claim their mistake so that we can verify them and send their bitcoin back, but so far as of this posting nobody has been able to verify it.”
However, it is unclear that which additional entity or entities received the remaining 145 BTC. Bruce Fenton the executive director of Bitcoin Foundation said that the proceeds will go towards the organization’s existing efforts which include funding education and public outreach.
Fenton said in his statement that, “The Bitcoin Foundation funding will be used for existing projects as well as new initiatives that will foster community dialogue and encourage an efficient development process of bitcoin technology.”
Previously, two foundation board members were resigned or were replaced, since the organization was said to be running out of funding for operations.
