# Synth Subnet - Miners Performance Commentary #19 By [Synth](https://paragraph.com/@synthdata) · 2025-07-23 --- Data From 2025-07-14 To 2025-07-20 Synth Rewards ------------- With the current value of Synth Alpha, last week, Synth paid 20,692 Alpha tokens to miners, equivalent to $79,457. Since March 2025, a total of 427,944 Alpha tokens have been distributed to miners, worth $1,643,307. On a monthly average since March 2025, Synth has paid $345,959 to miners, more than Numerai’s average monthly payout of $205,606. BTC, ETH, and XAU Volatility ---------------------------- Last week marked the first full week where Synth miners were tasked with forecasting gold (XAU). Therefore, this commentary also evaluates miners’ performance on gold predictions. **Figure 1** illustrates hourly log returns and volatility for Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), and Gold (XAU) during the week. We observe large differences in volatility among the three assets. Ethereum was the most volatile, while gold was the least—though it did momentarily reach BTC-level volatility during a spike on July 17. Bitcoin's volatility generally fell between that of Ethereum and gold. ![](https://storage.googleapis.com/papyrus_images/a578d49ac6b7bb1f393c62536ed7e2f1082e1c5bb6ba08fdb5130bc36721f3c4.png) Miners Performance ------------------ This week, we monitored the performance of six key miners: * **Top Performers**: Miners 153, 65, and 154 * **Dropped Out of Top Three**: Miners 221, 32, and 129 Axon affiliations: * Miner 221 → axon 35.77.6.189 * Miner 32 → axon 3.112.97.164 * Miner 154 → axon 95.216.99.113 * Miners 65, 129, 153 → axon 116.202.53.142 Performance was evaluated using two main metrics: * **CRPS** (Continuous Ranked Probability Score) for BTC and ETH forecasts * **Leaderboard Scores** **Continuous Ranked Probability Score (CRPS)**. Lower CRPS values indicate better predictive accuracy. Across all three assets, CRPS scores were tightly clustered between the two groups. However, ETH scores show that Miners 65 and 153 gained an edge between July 18–19 and during the weekend. In contrast, Miners 32 and 221 were hampered by poor gold forecasts early in the week and higher ETH CRPS scores over the weekend. Notably, the CRPS score magnitude varied by asset, which is expected due to differences in each asset’s volatility. ![](https://storage.googleapis.com/papyrus_images/198a733f53d41043590842f706fbe08d27a1daa1c6c5c121f6febf8ac2d6445c.png) **Leaderboard Scores**. These are exponentially weighted averages of past CRPS values over a 10-day window. Lower scores indicate better performance. Poor gold performance at the beginning of the week negatively impacted Miners 32 and 221, causing them to drop from the top 2 by Monday, July 14—replaced by Miners 65 and 154. Miner 129 held the top spot for most of the week but dropped out of the top 3 on Sunday, July 21, likely due to weaker ETH performance. ![](https://storage.googleapis.com/papyrus_images/46d2d5874ccf3842a331ad89163bb81ffb6803914efdc5b4789c4bd659c9f30b.png) Miners’ Strategies ------------------ This section analyzes summary statistics—volatility, kurtosis, and skewness—to detect potential strategic differences among top miners for both BTC and ETH. Summary Statistic Definitions: * Volatility: Variability in forecasted returns * Kurtosis: Measures the "tailedness" of the distribution—how likely extreme events are * Skewness: Measures the asymmetry of return distributions (0 = symmetric) Figure 4 presents these statistics for the four miners across the week. ![](https://storage.googleapis.com/papyrus_images/5d49110ac4807dd70605d793ac7d58c598e10a4e8671a428e9209f06c883ca36.png) Miners from axon 116.202.53.142 (65, 129, 153) and Miner 154 exhibited consistent modeling: similar volatility, kurtosis near 0, and stable, symmetric skewness. In contrast, Miners 32 and 221 produced more volatile and fat-tailed forecasts—particularly for gold—with greater skewness variability. **Miners’ Ranking vs. Summary Statistics:** All miners who submitted forecasts were ranked by total weekly rewards. Figure 5 shows how summary statistics vary across ranking tiers. ![](https://storage.googleapis.com/papyrus_images/d2e725aee554938aefffa0eefa2d411d0bfb1740f872a40979796e3f8c9b1cfe.png) We observed that lower-ranked miners are beginning to match the volatility levels of top-ranked miners for BTC and ETH. For gold, differences are more pronounced. In terms of kurtosis, miners ranked 10–30 are approaching top-tier performance for BTC, but disparities remain for ETH and XAU. Analysis by Axons ----------------- To assess performance at the group level, we analyzed: * Axon size (number of miners) * Average and total rewards per axon * Axon-level summary statistics (BTC, ETH, and XAU forecasts) Figure 6 shows the number of miners per axon at the end of the week. ![](https://storage.googleapis.com/papyrus_images/d9931ba62b4e424a94902dc3f56c0e48e7ae12cacdb056fe2f28a9ea1d2ec171.png) Axon 116.202.53.142 had the most miners, followed by 138.201.62.165 and 95.216.99.113. Figure 7 shows the evolution of average (per miner) and total daily rewards for the top 10 axons by average reward. ![](https://storage.googleapis.com/papyrus_images/9ccb3ebd5c48c4e287551b1655ea568cddcd79e570b6b6ca1ba779d26e651837.png) Axon 116.202.53.142 earned the highest total rewards, benefitting from both miner quantity and strong individual performance. On a per-miner basis: * **Early week**: Axon 185.150.117.101 led * **Midweek**: Axon 3.135.57.163 * **Weekend**: Axon 35.77.6.189 ### **All-Time Rewards (Since May 19, 2025)** 1. 116.202.53.142 – 44,143 Alpha ($169,510) 2. 35.77.6.189 – 26,007 Alpha ($99,867) 3. 95.216.99.113 – 23,192 Alpha ($89,058) 4. 186.233.184.223 – 20,834 Alpha ($80,001) 5. 18.183.47.137 – 13,597 Alpha ($52,211) 6. 3.112.97.164 – 13,308 Alpha ($51,104) 7. 95.111.205.93 – 8,456 Alpha ($32,469) 8. 35.78.218.102 – 7,244 Alpha ($27,816) 9. 103.88.234.233 – 6,121 Alpha ($23,505) 10. 160.202.130.77 – 4,347 Alpha ($16,691) **Figure 8** compares the top 10 axons (by average rewards) based on BTC, ETH, and XAU modeling statistics: average intraday volatility, volatility variability, and average intraday kurtosis. ![](https://storage.googleapis.com/papyrus_images/a512cbb8f0492e0d51876c2616122c0765c8c610fec65dec6ae32ff05ddec5bb.png) Forecasting styles are converging, particularly for BTC and ETH volatility. Some axons like 185.150.117.10 use low-volatility models, while others like 35.78.218.102 and 170.64.173.44 are more aggressive. Axon 185.150.117.10 showed significant intraday volatility for BTC and ETH but used flat volatility for gold. It modeled kurtosis for BTC/ETH but ignored it for gold. Axon 116.202.53.142 maintained consistent zero kurtosis across all assets. Takeaways --------- This week marked the beginning of performance evaluation for gold forecasts. As observed last week, the gap between top and mid-ranked miners is narrowing, with lower-ranked miners adopting increasingly similar modeling approaches—particularly in volatility. --- *Originally published on [Synth](https://paragraph.com/@synthdata/synth-subnet-miners-performance-commentary-19)*