Recently, I remembered a legendary figure in the crypto world—God Fish Mao Shixing. His name was quite well-known in the early mining circles.
It's a bit surreal to think about, a person experiencing ups and downs over ten years as if spanning an entire century. When he was 21 and still studying at Beijing University of Chemical Technology, he accidentally came across Bitcoin in a library. That chance encounter changed the entire course of his life. At that time, he was fascinated by this decentralized technology, even skipping classes to hang out on international Bitcoin forums, watching Satoshi Nakamoto and community interactions—feeling like he had discovered a new world.
In 2012, God Fish started mining. He bought a few graphics card mining rigs and earned 1 million yuan from his mined coins. But that wasn’t enough; he boldly founded China’s first Bitcoin mining pool—later known as Fish Pool. When Bitcoin surged to over $700 in 2013, his account value skyrocketed into the hundreds of millions. That feeling, I guess, is hard to describe in words.
But after the bull market came the bear market. In 2014, Bitcoin entered a long-term bear phase, and the mining industry collapsed as well. In May of that year, God Fish married a girl he met in the Bitcoin community. Interestingly, he didn’t buy a diamond ring—instead, he gave his wife 25 Bitcoins from a mined block. He even prepared a wallet address starting with “TLoveYou” and left a message in the transaction details: “Holding your hand, growing old together. God Fish to Dongdong.” This story sounds a bit romantic and magical.
The bear market in 2015 was too tough, so God Fish simply shut down his company. When the market started to recover in 2016, he restarted, this time focusing on Ethereum mining pools. During that period, he accumulated nearly 100k ETH. Later, he sold all of them, earning about 2 million yuan. But if he hadn’t sold back then, based on current prices, that would be a fortune of 2 billion yuan.
That’s the story of God Fish. Ten years in the crypto world, witnessing human greed and fear. The confusion of sudden wealth, the despair of losses, and those who choose to jump off buildings after losing everything overnight. Maybe that’s just the cruelty of the market.