Asian online gambling operator 500.com is ramping up its transition to cryptocurrency miner through the purchase of Jihan Wu’s crypto mining pool BTC.com.  

On Tuesday, the Shenzhen-based, Nasdaq-listed 500.com announced that it had reached a share exchange agreement with Blockchain Alliance Technologies Holding Company that will see 500.com assume control of the entire mining pool business of Bitdeer Technologies Holding Company, which operates as BTC.com. The deal also involves the transfer of the BTC.com domain and crypto wallet. 

The deal will see 500.com issue more than 44m Class A ordinary shares representing around 10% of its outstanding shares to Blockchain Alliance in exchange for all shares in Blockchain Alliance Technologies Ltd held by Blockchain Alliance. There’s also a potential top-up payment of 5% of 500.com’s outstanding shares should BTC.com report a net operating profit of at least US$20m in 2021. 

BTC.com ranks as the fourth largest mining pool with an estimated 10% of the BTC (Core coin) hash power. BitDeer’s beneficial owner is none other than Jihan Wu, co-founder of mining hardware outfit Bitmain, who left the firm in late-January following a prolonged and occasionally nasty feud with co-founder Micree Zhan.