Siyanbola Yassar is the founder and CEO of Trojan Mining, a company dedicated to mining Bitcoin in Nigeria. Yassar studied Aquaculture and Fisheries management at the University of Ibadan and is a self-taught tech enthusiast specializing in mechatronics, micro-controllers, system automatons, and mechanical and electronic hardware designs.
His journey to the discovery of Bitcoin started in January 2021 after failing to get investors to fund his electric bike delivery project. The funds he was getting from making baby fish for fish farmers were not enough to kickstart his project, so he partnered with a friend who was doing well as a crypto trader and decided to start trading crypto to get funds to invest in his electric bike project.
Like average newbies, I got started on the wrong path and was attracted to the promise of insane and crazy wealth people made from the Defi world. By late march 2021, I gathered all my fiat savings at about one hundred and fifty dollars and started altcoin trading; I went in with the notion of turning one hundred dollars into a 6-figure profit.
The first few weeks were astronomical; my portfolio grew to $900 plus; on a daily average, the market was good Bitcoin was at an all-time high, and my confidence was through the roof. However, all these insane gains come with a price; the adrenaline rush causes sleepless nights, and you will be up looking at charts and trying to figure out the next exit point after you profit or when the price is on a downtrend.
Just less than two months into trading, the bitcoin price was on a downtrend; I was new to crypto, never understood what the bear market was all about, and sadly had all my assets pegged to altcoins, even when my portfolio was losing value by 20% daily, I still had the faith that the market was going to recover, I am loyal, I have diamond hands.
By July, Bitcoin was at almost 50% low, and my altcoin portfolio went down below 600%. I was back to where I started; it was even worst. I lost everything, and I still had faith that when Bitcoin bounced back to an all-time high, my portfolio would be back. Yes, Bitcoin was back, but my altcoins never pumped. However, some people make money from altcoins, but it’s a risky investment; it’s just like gambling with your money.
With my bitter experience, I started asking questions, started reading and learning about crypto in general; I learned more about how the economy works, I learned about micro and macroeconomic principles, I learned about the top five cryptocurrencies, why they were meaningful, why they were successful, and this made me discover the valid reason why we need bitcoin, the reason why our fiat system is failing us.
The icebreaker for me was when I discovered and read about the bitcoin white paper; that was the ice breaker, getting to know the deflationary nature of Bitcoin, the security, the immutable nature of the network, and the reward you get from the proof of work algorithm aka mining.
Bitcoin mining is the process of creating a new bitcoin by solving puzzles. The first bitcoin miner to solve the puzzle the miner is rewarded with a bitcoin. The mining process also confirms transactions on the cryptocurrency’s network and makes them trustworthy. Dedicated special computers carry out these mining activities.
The main reason I got interested in bitcoin mining is that it created an avenue to earn passive income and stack Satoshis into your wallet every day without needing to worry about the volatility of the market, without needing to wake up in the middle of the night to check up on your crypto price chart.
By April 2021, after searching online for various Bitcoin miner vendors, I found a Chinese guy who was ready to sell me used bitcoin miners, that was what I could afford, and that was the best deal for me because I could quickly get my money back after four months of the mining as long as you have cheap electricity, I purchased one ant miner s9, and I was afraid I might have been scammed but eventually the miner arrived, I started mining at my mom’s house.
A month later, I got an investment of $3000 after pitching my ideas to several investors to buy two Innosilicon t2th. I also moved to a permanent industrial location for mining Bitcoin, where we have good electricity. Bitcoin miners generated 15 Billion Dollars in 2021; what if Nigeria owns 10% of total hash power, we would have an inflow of 1.5billion dollars into the country, which would help alleviate poverty to some extent.
Currently, we have eight Innosilicon miners and one ant miner s9, but now only seven are working; we have a combined hash rate of 296 terahash. Replacement parts will arrive soon for the remaining two miners. The constraints we have are poor infrastructure such as electric cabling, having access to power transformers, occasional power grid collapse, no available ASIC repair shop in the country, so we try to fix it yourself, and finally, delay in the procurement of replacement parts because we source them from china,
Trojan’s mining plan is to become the leading Bitcoin mining farm in Nigeria; we plan to set up a mini-hydro plant to be independent of the national grid and become carbon neutral. It’s not going to be easy, but we are taking baby steps. We are open to crypto enthusiasts, investors, and partnerships, too; we’d be glad to provide you with information and guidelines on setting up a successful mining farm.
