Oman unites legal miners: mandatory connection to the national pool
A sovereign approach to regulating cryptocurrency mining is taking new shape in the Middle East. Oman has officially launched a national mining pool, which all licensed digital asset miners in the country are required to join.
The project has been implemented under the auspices of Oman's Ministry of Transport, Communications and Information Technology in partnership with Frontier Technologies. The key technological link was provided by Enegix Global, which supplied the platform for pooling computing power and liquidity infrastructure.
At the initial stage, the pool will consolidate approximately 10 EH/s of hashrate. This is comparable to the capacity of medium-sized public mining companies, but the strategic significance of the initiative extends far beyond the current figures.
Billion-dollar investments in infrastructure
Since 2022, total investments in mining and data centers in the Salalah Free Zone have exceeded $700 million. Of particular note is the launch of a hydro-cooling facility worth $370 million — one of the largest such structures in the region.
The creation of a national pool is a logical step for a state seeking to place digital asset mining under centralized control, while simultaneously increasing operational transparency and tax collection. For market participants, this means losing flexibility in choosing pools, but gaining the status of a fully legal player in a jurisdiction with clear rules.
Analytical commentary: Oman is demonstrating a pragmatic approach typical of Gulf countries: instead of bans — total regulation with maximum economic benefit extraction. However, mandatory connection to a single pool creates risks of centralization and a single point of failure. In the event of a technical failure or regulatory pressure, the entire national mining industry would be affected. The market will closely watch how the sultanate resolves the dilemma between control and resilience.