Bitcoin Hashrate Dips and Mining Difficulty Expected to Fall

In recent times, the Bitcoin mining hashrate has been quite volatile, as it appears to be following the footsteps of the price of the pioneer cryptocurrency. Three days ago, the hashrate had reached almost 180 exahash (EH/s) zone, but two days later, it plummeted to a low of 128 EH/s. The recent changes have taken place before the difficulty adjustment of the network, which is scheduled to occur on Sunday. The difficulty level has increased for nine times straight, but this will be the first time since mid of July that the difficulty level will actually decline, rather than going up. 

The processing power of the Bitcoin network has slowed down significantly because of the fiat value of the leading crypto near the end of November. Almost a week ago, reports had indicated that Bitcoin’s hashrate was climbing steadily in the previous three months. On November 24th, Bitcoin’s hashrate had reached a high of 178 EH/s, but it is now coasting at 168 EH/s today. Once it had hit the high on Wednesday, the hashrate saw a major slump on Friday to 128 EH/s, which meant that it lost approximately 28% in a matter of 48 hours. 

Due to this slow down in hashrate, the network’s mining difficulty has also been affected and it is lower this usual. On Sunday, the mining difficulty will drop this Sunday for the first time after 17th July, 2021. After the change in difficulty in mid-July, the mining difficulty of BTC had increased nine times consecutively. Mining BTC is now 52.48% harder than it had been 133 days ago on 17th July. The next change is scheduled to happen today, in the early hours of morning and this difficulty level is expected to fall by 0.38%. Even though it is not that significant, it will certainly prevent the mining difficulty from hitting an all-time high (ATH). 

There have also been some major changes when it comes to the distribution of hashrate amongst the mining pools. The largest bitcoin mining pool today is Bitmain’s Antpool, which contributes 26.15 EH/s of the hashrate, or 16.79% of the network. The second-largest bitcoin mining pool is Foundry USA, as it contributes about 25.77 EH/s, or 16.55% of the network’s power. The third position is held by F2pool, which contributes 23.87 EH/s, or 15.33% of the network’s power. There are unknown stealth or hashrate miners that contribute hashpower of about 20 EH/s, or 13.14% of the network’s hashpower. 

The mining difficulty of Bitcoin recorded an ATH (all-time high) had reached a value of 25.05 trillion back on May 13th of the year. Today, the mining difficulty has reached about 22.67 trillion and the decrease expected on Sunday should reduce it to 22.59 trillion. While the change of 0.38% might be considered miniscule as opposed to other shifts in difficulty, but it will help in keeping the difficulty low for an additional two weeks. This is helpful for the miners, whereas the price of BTC has fallen significantly than what it was two weeks ago.