Bitcoin is not dying: Hash rate repeats all-time high
Over the years, there have been mixed feelings about the “death of bitcoin,” but the digital asset continues to prove the doubters wrong. This time, bitcoin has seen a significant drop in its hash rate which suggests that more miners are coming back online. This increase in hash rate has implications for the miners, but shows more interest in the network, causing the chain to glow green.
Bitcoin Hash Rate Hits New High
The Bitcoin hash rate had previously hit an all-time high back in June 2022. However, it would quickly plummet after the heat wave in the United States forced miners to shut down their rigs in an effort to conserve energy. Now the miners are coming back online as temperatures have stabilized, leading to an increase in hash rate during this time.
In the last 7 days, the mining hash rate has reached a new all-time high. It coincided with various public bitcoin miners coming back online. Furthermore, these public miners have been working to increase their hash rate to become more competitive in the market.
The increase in the hash rate has naturally led to an increase in the block production rate. Over the past couple of months, bitcoin miners had targeted a block production rate of 6 per hour, but they have now surpassed this with an average of 6.28 blocks produced per hour in the past week.
BTC hash rate reaches new ATH | Source: Arcane Research
Given this increase in the hash rate and the plans of bitcoin miners to bring more mining power online, Arcane Research predicts that the mining hash rate could reach as high as 245 EH/s by the end of 2022. And depending on how bitcoin performs price-wise, this can reach as high as 260 EH/s.
Miner incomes are growing
Hash rate hasn’t been the only thing that has risen in the past week. Bitcoin miners have fared much better in terms of earnings as they recorded a 5% growth in the last week. This pulled their daily earnings out of the $18 million level and has brought it closer to $20 million for the past week.
BTC struggling to hold $20,000 | Source: BTCUSD on TradingView.com
Positive growth was the theme of the week, with daily fees growing 4.59% and daily transaction volumes rising 6.50%, the highest growth of the week. Others include a 3.39% growth in transactions per day and a 3.01% growth in average transaction.
As for the hash rate reaching a new all-time high, there was a 3.25 increase in mining difficulty on Tuesday. This marked the fourth difficulty adjustment in a row, no doubt putting pressure on the profit margins of bitcoin miners.
Featured image from PYMNTS, charts from Arcane Research and TradingView.com
follow Best Owie on Twitter for market insights, updates and the occasional funny tweet…