poolin

Anonymous Bitcoin SV Miners Capture 55% of the Network Hashrate

25/03/2020 by Idelto Editor

The Bitcoin SV network has been a topic of conversation recently as stealth miners currently command more than 55% of the chain’s overall hashrate during the last seven days. Last year analysts noticed a large amount of the hashrate on all three SHA256 networks (BTC, BCH, and BSV) was being processed by mystery miners. Since then both BTC and BCH only have a small percentage of stealth miners hashing away at each network. Meanwhile, BSV and the coin’s community of participants currently face a block reward reduction 16 days from now.

Also read: Crypto Mining Crunch Time – Bitcoin Halving Less Than 50 Days Away While Global Economy Shudders

Mystery Miners Control Over 58% of the Bitcoin SV Network

There’s a whole lot of secret mining happening on the BSV blockchain and no one’s quite sure where the hashrate stems from. At press time, the stealth miners hashing the BSV chain right now represent 55% of the overall hash during the last seven days and 58% of the hashrate today. Most bitcoiners understand that if a single entity controls more than 51% of the network then it’s possible to execute double spends and chain reorganizations.

No one’s quite sure where all the hash is stemming from and whether or not it comes from multiple mining entities. What we do know is that since January 2019 and during the course of the year BTC, BSV, and BCH saw a bunch of mystery miners allocating a piece of the pie from the global hashrate. News.Bitcoin.com reported on BTC having around 22% of stealth hash on the network while BCH had 17% on January 28, 2019. More recently BCH had a brief period where more than 68% of the chain was stealth mined.

However, that event did not last very long and BSV is stretching a whole week’s worth of being over the 51% threshold limit. What’s even more interesting is that both BTC and BCH have very little unknown hash processing the networks as BTC has a hair over 5% and BCH has between 2-5%.

To add to the large percentage of hashrate being stealth mined on BSV, the network faces a block reward reduction in 16 days. Just like BCH and BTC, every 210,000 blocks BSV miners see a reward reduction and BSV miner rewards will drop from 12.5 coins to 6.25 per block. At press time the miners processing the remainder of BSV’s hashrate include Taal, Coingeek, Viabtc, Prohashing, Mining-dutch, Mempool, Svpool, Sigmapool, and Poolin.

Despite the Constant Controversy, Bitcoin SV Gained Over 178% in the Last Year

BSV has always been surrounded by controversy and known for its association with Craig Wright who claims to be Satoshi Nakamoto. Since forking, most of the chain’s transaction data has stemmed from a Twitter-like application called Twetch and a weather platform that records weather data. Coin Metrics reported last July that 96% of BSV transactions derived from the chain’s weather application. In the last 24 hours, the BSV chain has processed 599,851 transactions with an average block size around 1.795 MB.

There’s 2.9 exahash per second hashing away at the BSV network and the BSV hashrate has been fluctuating between +3 and -3% every 24 hours this week. At the time of publication, BSV is behind BCH, capturing the sixth-largest market cap position and trading for $178 per coin.

Anonymous Bitcoin SV Miners Capture 55% of the BSV Network Hashrate — BSV price on March 24, 2020.

In the last 90 days, BSV has gained 107% against the U.S. dollar and 178% in the last 12 months. Furthermore, when competing against BTC during the last year, BSV has gained around 62% against the digital asset.

What do you think about the mystery miners hashing away at more than 51% of the BSV network hashrate? Let us know in the comments below.

The post Anonymous Bitcoin SV Miners Capture 55% of the Network Hashrate appeared first on Bitcoin News.

BTC Hashrate Follows Price Drop – 20% Lower Before Bitcoin Halving

16/03/2020 by Idelto Editor

Four days ago, digital currency markets lost billions and prices sank to levels not seen since last March. The market bloodbath has affected bitcoin miners as they are making fewer profits than they were a week prior. By Monday, March 16, BTC’s hashrate slid below the 100 exahash (EH/s) territory and the BCH hashrate fell below 4 EH/s. Moreover, BCH has 22 days left until the block reward gets cut in half and there are 56 days until the BTC halving.

Also Read: Traders Flock to Tether, USDC, PAX – Stablecoins See Great Demand After Crypto Market Havoc

F2pool: ‘There’s Always a Lag in Hashrate Drops’

Cryptocurrency markets have lost a bunch of money during the last two weeks as more than $90 billion was erased from the market cap since the first week of March. At press time, BTC is hovering just below the $5K zone, while BCH is trading for $163 per coin. These prices have put intense pressure on miners hashing away at these two networks, and currently both networks have lost a good chunk of hashrate.

Hashrate Follows Price Drop - 20% Lower Before the Bitcoin Halving — Since the market dive on March 12, 2020, BTC’s hashrate slid roughly 20%. BCH hashrate is down to 3.5 to 3.8 EH/s after touching a 2020 high of 5 EH/s on February 20, 2020.

For instance, according to Coin.dance, the Bitcoin Cash network’s hashrate came awfully close to touching 5 EH/s during the third week of February, but on March 16 it’s between 3.5 to 3.8 EH/s. Similarly, up until March 11, BTC’s hashrate was around 120 EH/s but after the market rout on Thursday and the drop on Sunday, BTC’s hashrate is only around 97 EH/s. Both digital assets’ weekly price percentages are down between 33% (BCH) and 34% (BTC). The current prices might be too low for certain mining operations, which caused a small exodus of miners to leave the network.

The mining operation F2Pool commented on a recent article that noted BTC’s hashrate “barely flinched” when prices dropped to $3,600 on March 12. “However, we saw over the weekend the estimated difficulty change is trending downward,” F2Pool tweeted. “This means some miners are now switching off their machines. As always in mining, it’s the survival of the fittest: New Machines. Cheap Electricity. Low Rent.” F2Pool further stated:

The network hashrate has dropped from a peak of ~124 EH/s to ~102 EH/s, while the bitcoin price has dropped from $9,000 to $4,800. There is always a time lag for hashrate to decrease due to hosting contracts, and the time required for operators to turn off a large number of machines.

While Hashrate and Prices Dip, the Countdown to the Reward Halving Continues

BTC prices on March 16 are making it difficult for bitcoin miners to garner a profit depending on what they pay for electricity rates. For instance, miners paying $0.07 per kilowatt-hour (kWh) with today’s top machines that have 40-100 terahash per second (TH/s) are still profiting. 86 TH/s can make around $1.54 per day while 44 TH/s can make around $0.27 per day.

However, if one was to up the electric cost to $0.12 per kWh, then a machine with over 100TH/s could still lose $0.17 per day at today’s exchange rates. Further, both networks are facing block subsidy halvings, as each protocol halves every 210,000 blocks. BTC and BCH miners’ coinbase rewards will decrease from 12.5 to 6.25 coins in less than two months. The BTC halving is set to happen on or around May 12, or 56 days from now. BCH will halve earlier than that on or around April 8, or in 22 days.

Bitcoiners are still positive about the halving and a number of BTC supporters believe it will make the price rise. “Bitcoin usually recovers very quickly,” one individual tweeted on Monday. “It could be $1,000-2,000 next week and still easily be $6,000 by halving.” Other speculators are more negative and understand that if BTC prices don’t rise there could be severe consequences.

“Bitcoin simply can’t be worth what it is now or lower and survive the halving,” @Cryptomessiah noted. “$1000 bitcoin? Might as well bet on $0 bitcoin.” Another person tweeted:

The worst part about bitcoin right now is that crypto folks have already been through a nasty bear market from late 2017 and when we were just about to pull out of it we entered another as the traditional markets bleed out — The halving is my only hope right now.

While both BCH and BTC hashrates saw a decline, users can visualize miners capitulating by monitoring individual pools as well. For instance, Btc.com’s hashrate dipped by 10% and Poolin’s hash slipped by 15%. F2pool suffered a hashrate loss of 12% and Huobi’s mining pool saw the pool’s hash decline by 22% during the market downturn.

The overall SHA256 hashrate drop on Monday shows that miners need better prices in order to profit, but they will need even more value after the reward halving. For example, during the first week of February 2020, the research and analysis firm Tradeblock published a report that estimates the post-halving mining cost. The researchers noted that post-halving estimates need to be around $12,500 per BTC or more.

What do you think about the recent hashrate drop and the upcoming halvings? Do you think that the cryptoconomy needs to increase in value by the time the halvings approach? Let us know what you think about this subject in the comments section below.

Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only. It is not an offer or solicitation of an offer to buy or sell, or a recommendation, endorsement, or sponsorship of any products, services, or companies. Bitcoin.com does not provide investment, tax, legal, or accounting advice. Neither the company nor the author is responsible, directly or indirectly, for any damage or loss caused or alleged to be caused by or in connection with the use of or reliance on any content, goods or services mentioned in this article. Price articles and market updates are intended for informational purposes only and should not be considered as trading advice. Neither Bitcoin.com nor the author is responsible for any losses or gains, as the ultimate decision to conduct a trade is made by the reader. Cryptocurrency prices referenced in this article were recorded on Monday, March 16, 2020.

Image credits: Shutterstock, Fork.lol, bitcoinblockhalf.com, bitcoincashblockhalf.com, blockchain.com, asicminervalue.com, Fair Use, Wiki Commons, and Pixabay.

Do you want to maximize your Bitcoin Mining potential? Plug your own hardware into the world’s most profitable Bitcoin mining pool or get started without having to own hardware through one of our competitive Bitcoin cloud mining contracts.

The post BTC Hashrate Follows Price Drop – 20% Lower Before Bitcoin Halving appeared first on Bitcoin News.

5 Mining Operations Command More Than 50% of BTC’s Network Hashrate

03/02/2020 by Idelto Editor

The cryptocurrency community has been discussing mining centralization after a report was published that disclosed five mining operations command more than 50% of the BTC hashrate. At the time of publication, between F2pool, Poolin, Btc.com, and Antpool, the pools are hashing more than 59% of the BTC network hashrate.

Also read: Bitcoin Verde’s New Project Aims to Promote Bitcoin Cash Node Diversity

Data-Driven Report Says BTC Hashrate Distribution Is Centralized

On January 31, researchers from the firm Tokenanalyst published a report entitled “Centralisation in Bitcoin Mining: A Data-Driven Investigation” which covers the BTC hashrate distribution in 2020. The latest Tokenanalyst study stresses that BTC is decentralized and a trustless system, but researchers believe hashrate distribution is quite centralized.

“In 2020, bitcoin has also become a highly centralised system that places an increasing amount of trust in a small number of large entities,” the report notes. Not only is the mining landscape “dominated by a small number of entities,” but Tokenanalyst also thinks “a few large crypto exchanges” dominate the industry as well. Tokenanalyst analyzed 276,000 distinct addresses that have received coinbase rewards and they “meticulously” QA’d their metrics and found 148,000 miner addresses “across the whole history of the bitcoin blockchain.”

“Of these 148k labeled addresses only 6.3k have ever received a coinbase reward,” the report details. “The other addresses are used by miners for other purposes, such as internal routing and change wallets to facilitate payments to mining pool participants.” The report continued by adding:

Of the 276k addresses that ever received coinbase rewards, 270k are unlabeled, and of these, 225k addresses (81.5% of the total) were only ever used once. Of the 6.3K labeled addresses that received block rewards, just 517 addresses received block rewards on more than 1 occasion (0.2% of the total). However, these 517 addresses are responsible for receiving a vast proportion of the block rewards in recent years.

Five Mining Operations Command More Than 50% of BTC's Network Hashrate — “Today, 95% of the blocks mined are by mining pools that Tokenanalyst has labeled,” the study notes. “The proportion of hashrate attributed to different mining pools. The miners who contributed the largest proportion of the hashrate over the last 12 months are labeled.”

The Stratum Protocol and Joining Smaller, Independent Pools

Tokenanalyst researchers detailed that the firm Bitdeer, a company that sells customers hashrate, leverages the five unique pools to do so. Currently, Bitdeer utilizes the top five mining operations hashing on the BTC network — Antpool, Btc.com, Btc.top, F2pool, and Viabtc. “On 27th January 2020 these 5 mining entities controlled 49.9% of the hashrate of the bitcoin network,” the study reveals. “Collaborating and cooperating would allow involved mining pools to hedge against risk — the risk of a single mining facility going offline, the risk of customers switching between pools, the risk of energy price fluctuations in particular regions,” the Tokenanalyst researchers insist.

A few BTC supporters are not too concerned with the current mining pool distribution situation and they believe the network will work itself out. There have been discussions of fixing the problem with a mining protocol called Stratum v2 as well, which allows software users to choose which BTC transactions get mined.

Stratum v2 allows protocol users to choose which BTC transactions get mined.

Tokenanalyst believes the “original model of bitcoin mining was to have a large number of independent miners which would make it all but impossible to attack the network by reversing bitcoin transactions.” So the researchers are telling the public to research the number of pools within the industry and to search for independent mining operations.

“Do your research before you connect your hardware to a pool, or pay for a hashrate plan on a particular pool,” Tokenanalyst’s report concludes. “Joining a more independent mining pool or a pool with a smaller proportion of the hash rate will help ensure the integrity of the network.”

What do you think about Tokenanalyst’s report that covers BTC hashrate distribution and dominant mining operations? Do you think it is concerning or do you think the network will work itself out over the long run? Let us know what you think about this subject in the comments section below.

Image credits: Shutterstock, Blockchain.com, Stratum website, Tokenanalyst, Fair Use, Wiki Commons, and Pixabay.

Did you know you can earn BTC and BCH through Bitcoin Mining? If you already own hardware, connect it to our powerful Bitcoin mining pool. If not, you can easily get started through one of our flexible Bitcoin cloud mining contracts.

The post 5 Mining Operations Command More Than 50% of BTC’s Network Hashrate appeared first on Bitcoin News.

Jiang Zhuoer Restructures Development Funding Proposal for Bitcoin Cash

01/02/2020 by Idelto Editor

On January 31, Btc.top founder Jiang Zhuoer addressed the Bitcoin Cash (BCH) community again after his initial proposal last Wednesday was met with mixed responses. Zhuoer changed a number of specifics within the proposed Infrastructure Funding Plan for Bitcoin Cash and hopes the community will agree with his opinions.

Also read: Cashfusion Far More Practical Than Other Coinjoin Protocols, Says Data Analyst

Btc.top Founder Jiang Zhuoer Discusses a New Bitcoin Cash Infrastructure Funding Plan Arrangement

The CEO of the mining operation Btc.top decided to address BCH supporters again with a restructured Infrastructure Funding Plan (IFP) for Bitcoin Cash by writing a blog post on the platform read.cash. He’s made a number of changes to the original proposal and the IFP does not include the Hong Kong corporation and the concept of orphaning blocks. Zhuoer also addressed his comment about the “no debate” concept and said that it doesn’t mean he refuses to accept other people’s opinions. “Let us stop debating and give it a try, if the test turns out positive, we continue, otherwise we stop,” is what Zhuoer meant by “no debate.” The first thing Zhuoer discussed was the donate mechanism.

“[BCH] miners will donate directly to the development projects,” Zhuoer said. “Miners will directly send part of their coinbase to the projects they want to donate, for example, miner X can direct n% of his coinbase to the address of project A, direct m% of his coinbase to the address of project B.” Zhuoer thinks a foundation should be created and if a miner doesn’t know who they want to donate to, they can donate directly to a foundation. The mining operator thinks a foundation should start before the plan starts and be “ready to accept donations from miners, as well as from other non-miner individuals and corporations.” Zhuoer also thinks the foundation should run for a pilot period in order to “show the effect to the community.” The miner insisted:

Therefore, a sound competition mechanism has been established, all the projects (including more than one foundation) must work hard, ensure the full public disclosure and transparency of their business finance, in order to earn more support and donations from the community (miners and non-miners).

Miners who do not like any of the projects or are not willing to donate can avoid the “tragedy of the commons” by donating a fraction of their coinbase to a BCH black hole address. The address will “destroy the coins” and the Btc.top founder believes “this is in fact a donation to all BCH holders.” Zhuoer also discussed a hashrate voting proposal and said that miners could leverage bmp.virtualpool.com to vote. He wants to try the BMP voting for three months and if 2/3 of the hashpower votes are in favor of the donation plan, then Zhuoer hopes developers can include the donation plan in the May 2020 upgrade. “If there is not enough time, then include the plan in the protocol upgrade in November 2020,” Zhuoer asserted.

Zhuoer Will Use His Own Petahash and Coinbase Donations Are Reduced

Btc.top’s CEO also said there’s a lot of stealth miners right now and sometimes unknown miners are commanding more than half of the overall BCH hashrate. “Most of these anonymous miners actually come from Poolin (Poolin.com), they mine BCH only when its profit is higher,” he stressed. “As long as we mine at a loss and control the BCH mining profit slightly lower than BTC mining profit, those anonymous miners who think of nothing but making money will not mine BCH,” Zhuoer added. The mining operator further stated:

I personally hold 3500PH/s of hashpower, and I can also influence almost 10,000PH/s of hashpower so that the total hashpower amount will be sufficient. In consideration of that BCH mining may sometimes lose money, and I am one of the shareholders of the Btc.top mining pool, I can not ask the company to lose money. As a result, I will allocate my personal hashpower to a new mining pool (D.TOP) and please do not be surprised when you see this new mining pool appear and accounts for a higher percentage [of hashpower].

Zhuoer concluded his blog post by adding that the 12.5% coinbase donation ration is too high. “I believe by the middle or the end of 2020, 2-3% of the donation ratio is sufficient and 1% [will] probably be sufficient in 2021,” Zhuoer remarked. Lastly, Zhuoer said that he’s been reading everyone’s opinions and he decided to publish the second proposal using read.cash as opposed to Medium.com’s blog. Zhuoer’s blog post has a large number of comments and BCH supporters have been writing their own blog posts on read.cash in response while also sharing their opinions on social media.

What do you think about BCH miners donating to Bitcoin Cash infrastructure development? Let us know what you think about this topic in the comments section below.

Image credits: Shutterstock, Pixabay, Fair Use, Wiki Commons, and the Bitcoin Cash logo.

The post Jiang Zhuoer Restructures Development Funding Proposal for Bitcoin Cash appeared first on Bitcoin News.

Bitcoin Mining Operations Offer New Strategies Before Reward Reduction

10/12/2019 by Idelto Editor

Bitcoin Mining Operations Offer New Strategies Before the Reward Reduction

As the reward halving approaches, bitcoin miners are preparing new strategies so customers can reap the most profits from their hashrate services. On December 3, the mining operation Poolin introduced a hashrate auto-switch feature so clients can automatically switch between BTC and BCH mining. Moreover, a few days later at Bitmain’s annual customer appreciation meeting, the company’s CEO Jihan Wu explained the firm is offering three strategic mining offerings.

Also read: Mining Chip Maker Ebang Next in Line to File for US IPO

Poolin’s Auto-Switch Feature

Bitcoin mining is extremely competitive, and currently there’s a lot of processing power pointed at the SHA256 consensus networks BTC, BCH, and BSV. Ever since miners could choose between the BTC chain and the BCH chain, the profitability between those two networks has varied. For instance, at the time of publication, it is 2.5% more profitable to mine on the Bitcoin Cash blockchain, but this metric can change often.

Similarly, the profitability between BTC and BCH can vary against BSV as well. Most miners process blocks on both the BCH and BTC chains, but a few operations mine all three chains depending on profit changes. Just recently, the mining operation Poolin announced a new hashrate auto-switch feature that will automatically connect to the most profitable chain between BCH and BTC. Poolin says that BSV will be included in the near future as well. According to Poolin, the hashrate auto-switch functionality will only work with cryptocurrencies using the same algorithm.

“We are thrilled to provide this feature that will increase profits for our miners, this hashrate auto-switch continues in the direction that Poolin has been forging, mainly, bringing excellence to this industry and customer-first service,” Poolin’s VP Alejandro De La Torre announced.

The hashrate auto-switch feature was discussed on crypto-centric forums and one person asked if the switching feature would “make block time variance worse.” “Not really since just 2.8% of BCH miners are from Poolin. It’s mostly annoying for Bitcoin since its difficulty won’t adjust as fast to switching miners,” a BCH supporter replied.

Bitmain’s Three Strategies

Following the announcement from Poolin, Bitmain’s Jihan Wu revealed three new strategies for customers at the company’s annual customer appreciation meeting. Regional reports from China say that the Bitmain CEO introduced “installment payments,” “option hedging” and “joint mining” services. With the installment payment system, big facilities that purchase 100+ mining devices can put 50% down. Let’s say they want to purchase 5,000 mining rigs, then only a 20% down payment is required. However, the buyer needs to settle up seven days before the items are delivered. Jihan Wu also told attendees about the option hedging plan that will protect the price of bitcoin. He said that Bitmain plans to purchase options from the company Matrixport in order to combat price dumping. Local reports detail that the Bitmain option product is called the “Bitcoin 2020 / 3 / 27 35000 CNY Put Option.”

In addition to the installment payments and option hedging, Jihan Wu spoke about offering a joint mining service that lasts 12 months. Reportedly, Bitmain will provide S17 mining rigs and pay the electrical costs, but the buyer needs to provide a facility and maintenance personnel. “The income during the cooperation period is settled on a monthly basis, which is distributed as 25% for the partners and 75% for Bitmain,” 8btc columnist Vincent He explained. “If the revenue cannot offset the electricity charge, no distribution will be made.”

Structure Changes and New Mining Services Will Be Offered Prior to the Halving

It’s likely that many mining operations will change their structure and offer new features as signs of this trend have been cropping up six months before the reward halving. On Halloween, Bitcoin.com published a video of professional miners from around the world explaining what they think will happen when the block reward shrinks. The film included mining heavyweights like F2Pool’s Global Director Thomas Heller, Hyperblock’s CEO Sean Walsh, and Genesis Mining CEO Marco Streng. Some of the miners’ predictions in the video showed why SHA256 mining operations are trying to profit with new types of provisions like hashrate auto-switching and joint mining services.

“If you look at six months before the halving and six months after the halving in both previous instances you see a massive upward surge in the price of bitcoin,” Sean Walsh remarked in the film. “It is a bit scary being a miner and knowing that your revenue stream is gonna get cut in half overnight, but the exchange rate will more than compensate for the reduction in our bitcoin denominated revenue.”

What do you think about mining operations offering new types of services just before the halving takes place? Let us know what you think about this subject in the comments section below.

Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only. Neither the company nor the author is responsible, directly or indirectly, for any damage or loss caused or alleged to be caused by or in connection with the use of or reliance on any content, goods or services mentioned in this article.

Image credits: Shutterstock, Blockchain.com, Coin Dance Cash, news.8btc.com, Wiki Commons, Fair Use, Bitmain, and Pixabay.

The post Bitcoin Mining Operations Offer New Strategies Before Reward Reduction appeared first on Bitcoin News.