Over the years, there have been various sentiments regarding the “death of bitcoin,” but the digital asset continues to prove doubters wrong. This time around, bitcoin has seen a significant rebound in its hash rate that suggests more miners are coming back online. This increase in hash rate carries implications for the miners but shows more interest in the network, causing on-chain metrics to light up green.
Bitcoin Hash Rate Reaches New HighThe bitcoin hash rate had previously reached its all-time high back in June of 2022. However, it would quickly plummet following the heat wave in the US that forced miners to shut off their rigs in a bid to preserve energy. Now, the miners are coming back online as temperatures have stabilized, leading to a surge in the hash rate over this time.
In the last 7 days, the mining hash rate reached a new all-time high. It coincided with various public bitcoin miners coming back online. Furthermore, these public miners have been working towards increasing their hash rate to be more competitive in the market.
The increase in the hash rate has naturally led to an increase in the block production rate. Over the last couple of months, bitcoin miners had been targeting 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 last week.
Given this rise in the hash rate and plans of bitcoin miners to bring more mining power online, Arcane Research predicts that the mining hash rate might reach as high as 245 EH/s by the end of 2022. And depending on how bitcoin performs price-wise, this might reach as high as 260 EH/s.
Miner Revenues GrowsThe hash rate has not been the only thing that rose in the last week. Bitcoin miners have been doing much better in terms of revenue as they recorded a 5% growth for the last week. This pulled their daily revenues out of the $18 million level and has brought it close to $20 million for the last week.
BTC struggling to hold $20,000 | Source: BTCUSD on TradingView.comPositive growth was the theme for the week, with daily fees growing 4.59% and daily transaction volumes rising 6.50%, the highest growth for the week. Others include a 3.39% growth in transactions per day and a 3.01% growth in the 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 accounted for the fourth consecutive upwards difficulty adjustment, which is no doubt putting pressure on the profit margins of bitcoin miners.
Featured image from PYMNTS, charts from Arcane Research and TradingView.comFollow Best Owie on Twitter for market insights, updates, and the occasional funny tweet…
