Despite the increase in mining difficulty and the drop in hashrate, Bitcoin’s overall hashrate is still growing. In fact, on Wednesday, it was just 12 exahashes per second (EH/s) away from reaching its peak of 677 EH/s, which was recorded on July 25.
Bitcoin Mining Operations Slash Hashrate Price, Approaching Record Hashrate
On August 28, 2024, Bitcoin mining difficulty increased by 2.99%, rising from 86.87 trillion to 89.47 trillion, making it harder for miners to find blocks. At the same time, Bitcoin’s price has fallen by 1.5% over the past week, even after a brief rally on September 4.
At the same time, miners are still facing low revenues, with the current price of 1 petahash per second (PH/s) of mining per day sitting at $41.69. However, this is a significant improvement over August 5th, when the price per petahash per day was 16.51% lower at $35.78 per PH/s.
While Bitcoin miners struggle with low revenues and near-record difficulty levels, the industry’s hashing performance has been nothing short of extraordinary. As of 2:00 PM EDT on Wednesday, the total hash rate was 665 exahashes per second (EH/s), just 12 EH/s shy of its all-time peak.
If the price of Bitcoin rises next week, the hash rate could easily break the previous record set on July 25. However, the rising hash rate and shorter intervals between blocks could trigger another difficulty adjustment increase, which is projected for September 11, 2024.
As of 2:00 PM EDT on September 4, the estimated difficulty is set to increase by 2.2%, though that could change over the next five and a half days. Of the 665 EH/s recorded on Wednesday, Foundry is contributing 201.25 EH/s, while Antpool is managing 167.47 EH/s of SHA256 hashing power.
As of this afternoon, September 4, there were around 55 established mining pools supporting the Bitcoin blockchain. The rising hashrate is an encouraging sign that miners are surviving the recent revenue slump thanks to a few key buffers.
These include the huge fees collected on the day of the fourth halving, the recently released cutting-edge mining hardware delivering impressive terahashes per second (TH/s), and the sale of shares available to publicly traded mining companies. The real question is, how long can these buffers support Bitcoin mining operations if the downturn continues?
What do you think about the recent increase in overall hashrate despite the difficulty spike and revenue decline? Share your thoughts and opinions on the matter in the comments section below.
