Coin Metrics

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.

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Onchain Data Suggests Bitcoin Sell-Off Fueled by New Investors

20/03/2020 by Idelto Editor

While the covid-19 outbreak has caused economic calamity, cryptocurrencies have regained some of the losses that devastated digital currency markets on March 12. A recent report published by the researchers at Coin Metrics notes the “crypto asset sell-off was driven by short-term holders.” Further, an analyst at Unchained Capital agreed with Coin Metrics’ findings and wrote that “a majority of the volatility came from UTXOs 6 months old or younger.”

Also read: The 35 Most Influential Bitcoiners Dominating Crypto Twitter by Follower Count

Coin Metrics’ State of the Network Research Claims Short-Term Holders Fueled the Crypto Asset Sell-Off

The events of March 12 left people wondering why BTC and many other cryptocurrencies lost considerable value. Of course, most individuals understood that the panic selling stemmed from the fears surrounding the covid-19 outbreak that ravaged global markets. Furthermore, speculators have assumed that the Plustoken scammers offloaded a large sum of ETH and BTC prior to the dump. In total, crypto markets lost $44 billion in a matter of hours on March 12 as BTC spot prices dropped to a low of $3,870 per coin. Since then, however, BTC has managed to climb back over the $6K, region gaining more than 16% in the last week. Top performing digital currencies like bitcoin cash (BCH) saw seven-day percentage gains upwards of over 30%.

Following the crypto market carnage, Coin Metrics researcher Nate Maddrey and fellow team members published data that shows the “crypto asset sell-off was driven by short-term holders.” Maddrey highlighted that on March 12 “growing concerns over the COVID-19 pandemic” caused one of the largest one-day price drops in BTC’s history. The researcher also noted that the entire cryptoconomy followed suit as most coins lost more than 30% in a week. Further, despite all the people saying that BTC is uncorrelated, Coin Metrics’ “State of the Network” update underscored that “BTC and the S&P 500’s correlation touched a new all-time high.”

“BTC’s historic price drop was concurrent with the equity markets’ worst day since 1987,” Maddrey wrote. “On March 12th, the Pearson correlation between BTC and the S&P 500 soared to a new all-time high of 0.52. The previous all-time high was 0.32. This suggests crypto asset markets are becoming more intertwined with existing markets, and are reacting to external events more than we have ever seen before.”

BTC prices also reacted to certain events during the last two weeks including the Fed’s emergency rate cuts and Trump’s travel ban announcement. Coin Metrics and Maddrey believe that most of the BTC sellers appeared to be short-term holders. “On-chain data shows that recent price movements were likely mostly driven by shorter-term and relatively new holders,” Maddrey’s research details. “Coin Metrics’ revived supply tracks how many old coins come back into circulation after being untouched for a specific period of time. For example, thirty day revived supply tracks how much supply is moved on-chain (i.e. transacted) after being untouched for at least thirty days.” The researcher added:

On March 11th, about 281k BTC that had been untouched for at least thirty days were revived. But only 4,131 BTC that had been untouched for at least one year were revived. This signals that a vast majority of the activity on March 11th and March 12th involved BTC that had been held for less than a year.

Unchained Capital Notices Similar Patterns

Researchers at Unchained Capital decided to review the firm’s HODL Waves charts to find out who has been selling and holding as well. “The volatility certainly didn’t come from the 5-year [holders]. Are those coins lost or do those bitcoiners have hands of steel?” Unchained Capital tweeted. “Over the course of the last year, the percent of 5-year coins has increased from 20.37% > 21.65%, or by ~233,800 BTC.” The final tweet in Unchained Capital’s thread explained:

A majority of the volatility came from UTXOs 6 months old or younger.

Traditionally, new investors jumping into global markets have weak hands compared to seasoned traders and the same goes for crypto investors as well. New crypto investors usually make the same mistakes like waiting too long to invest, investing too little even though they have enough money, frequently making trades without patience, buying while markets are spiking in value and selling based on emotions. With characteristics like this and data stemming from Unchained Capital and Coin Metrics, it’s likely new investors were the ones who dumped their coins and veterans are still sticking around for the long haul.

What do you think about short-term holders driving most of the cryptocurrency market sell-off? Let us know what you think about this topic in the comments section below.

Image credits: Shutterstock, Coin Metrics’ State of the Network and Community Data, Coin Metrics Network Data Pro, Unchained Capital, HODL Waves, Fair Use, Twitter, and Pixabay.

Want to create your own secure cold storage paper wallet? Check our tools section. You can also enjoy the easiest way to buy Bitcoin online with us. Download your free Bitcoin wallet and head to our Purchase Bitcoin page where you can buy BCH and BTC securely.

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HODL Waves Chart Reveals Bitcoin Holders’ Firm Grip – 42% Hasn’t Moved in 2 Years

05/03/2020 by Idelto Editor

According to a report written by Coin Metrics analyst Jacob Franek, as of March 1, 2020, roughly 42% of all BTC has not moved onchain in more than two years. The metric is the largest number since June 2017 and the study notes that “HODL waves” have grown larger.

Also Read: Get Ready for the Bitcoin Halving – Here Are 9 Countdown Clocks You Can Monitor

42% of All the Bitcoin in Existence Has Not Moved in Two Years

On March 3, Coin Metrics published its “State of the Network” update which covers the BTC network by leveraging various perspectives and data sets. Within the report written by Jacob Franek, the researcher discusses unspent transaction output (UTXO) age analysis and HODL waves. News.Bitcoin.com first reported on the subject of HODL waves in April 2018, after Dhruv Bansal, the cofounder of Unchained Capital, published an in-depth report on the subject. Essentially, Bansal and his team described how they analyzed the BTC network’s UTXOs over the course of a few years and figured out how to measure distinct holding periods. A bitcoin UTXO represents the unspent funds stemming from bitcoin transactions and this data is recorded on the blockchain. When Coin Metrics analyst Franek discussed the subject in the latest update, he noted the earliest contribution to this field was when the term “Bitcoin days destroyed” was first defined.

Franek noted other contributions to the study of HODL waves in 2014 and the writer mentioned Bansal’s 2018 research as well. Unchained Capital’s post on the subject was “instrumental in introducing active supply to a broader audience,” Franek wrote. Two more studies were mentioned (Blummer 2018 and Hauge 2019) in Coin Metrics’ report, both of which research the behavior of bitcoin holders from different angles. When mentioning Franek’s study, fellow Coin Metrics researcher Nate Maddrey explained that 42% of all BTC hasn’t moved in two years. “As of March 1st, about 42% of all BTC has not been moved on-chain (i.e. transacted) for at least two years,” Maddrey tweeted. The analyst added:

The amount of BTC untouched in more than two years has not eclipsed 42% since July, 2017.

Unchained Capital has a live chart that shows all the bitcoins in existence and waves are defined by Bitcoin Age Days (BADs). Essentially, the colored coded chart calculates waves of age distribution within BTC’s identified UTXOs and their age distribution set back to the genesis block in 2009. “The colored bands show the relative fraction of Bitcoin in existence that was last transacted within the time window indicated in the legend,” the Unchained Capital HODL waves chart notes. “The bottom, warmer colors (reds, oranges) represent Bitcoin transacting very recently while the top, cooler colors (greens, blues) represent Bitcoin that hasn’t transacted in a long time.”

The ‘Iron Hands’ of Bitcoin Cash Holders and the Upcoming Reward Halvings

BTC holders are not the only crypto proponents storing their coins for long periods of time. A recent post on the Reddit forum r/btc called “Iron Hands” compares three different cryptocurrencies (BTC, ETH, and BCH) using Coinmarketcap.com’s new chain analysis feature. According to the screenshot and Coinmarketcap.com statistics, the holders’ composition by time held shows that BCH is around 92%, while BTC is 63% and ETH is 54%.

“Interesting that a higher percentage of BCH users are using [bitcoin cash] as a store of value than BTC users,” Bitcoin.com’s executive chairman Roger Ver wrote in response to the thread. “BCH isn’t just a store of value, it’s a great medium of exchange. And like any currency, financially responsible folks will spend some and save some,” explained another BCH proponent on Reddit. Data from charts.Bitcoin.com shows the UTXO Set Size for the BCH network is 68 million, while statistics from the BTC network’s UTXO Set Size are around the same.

The great hodling of BTC and BCH has been taking place just before both networks experience the block subsidy halvings. The BTC chain has 9,819 blocks left to go (at the time of writing) and 68 days left until the halving on or around May 11, 2020. The BCH chain has 5,001 blocks left to go and 34 days left until the halving on or around April 8, 2020.

What do you think about the recent study by Coin Metrics analyst Jacob Franek and the HODL waves research? What do you think about bitcoin cash holders composition by time held showing that BCH is being held for longer periods? 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. 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, halving updates and market reports 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.

Image credits: Shutterstock, Unchained Capital, Coin Metrics, Reddit user u/TravisWash, bitcoincashblockhalf.com, bitcoinblockhalf.com, Fair Use, Coinmarketcap.com, Wiki Commons, and Pixabay.

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4 ‘Bitcoin Contenders’ With Zero Use Cases and Barely Any Infrastructure

06/02/2020 by Idelto Editor

Cryptocurrency markets and the industry are extremely competitive and many users believe a single digital asset will reign someday, and that it may not be BTC. Over the last few years, many holders believe the assets they hold are bitcoin contenders with coins like IOTA, EOS, ADA, XRP, and XLM being popular choices. However many of these cryptocurrencies see very little use and have seen their price values slashed enough to make any holder cringe.

Also Read: Market Update: Bitcoin Cash Shines as Crypto Markets Show Bullish Signals

Four So-Called ‘Bitcoin Contenders’

Recently the entire digital currency market capitalization has gained billions of dollars and a great number of people believe an “altcoin season” could happen before the next great bull run. There are definitely people who believe certain coins are BTC contenders. But belief is one thing and numbers often tell a different story as certain digital asset hopefuls are barely being used or have zero products.

The ones that are being used are significantly centralized, have frozen accounts, are plagued with bots and are still down more than 80% since their all-time price highs. Today we’re going to look at four specific digital currencies and see how they stack up to BTC’s market price and onchain performance. IOTA, EOS, ADA, and XLM have been hailed as bitcoin contenders in the past and data explains how they have been doing recently.

4 'Bitcoin Contenders' With Zero Use Cases and Hardly Any Infrastructure — A brief look at IOTA, EOS, ADA, and XLM social benchmarks, price, controversies, and onchain performance.

IOTA — Down 94% From Its All-Time High

IOTA or MIOTA is a “transactional settlement and data transfer layer” aimed at tackling the Internet of Things (IoT). According to the white paper, the system uses a new type of distributed ledger technology called “Tangle.” Developers call the system revolutionary compared to traditional blockchains thanks to introducing new consensus mechanisms. However, the chain has had a myriad of issues including halting for 15 hours during the last week of December 2019.

At press time, IOTA is worth $0.33 per coin and the value is up 30% this year but it’s down 50% against BTC. IOTA reached an all-time high (ATH) of $5.69 per coin 779 days ago and it’s down 94% since that point. The digital asset has around $29 million in daily trade volume compared to BTC’s $5.6 billion in 24-hour trade volume. The IOTA Reddit community has around 113,000 subscribers and 122,000 Twitter followers. The crypto economics benchmark from Coindesk gives IOTA 6.74%, which is lower than usual in comparison to most other cryptos.

Right now lots of people take issue with the downtime and centralization tied to the IOTA Foundation and the current direction of the project. IOTA community member social media posts show they are infighting frequently and IOTA leaders are battling as well. The 24-hour transaction data for IOTA is not something recorded on most data sites including Coin Metrics and bitinfocharts.com.

EOS — Down 80% From Its All-Time High

EOS or the EOSIO platform is another form of distributed ledger technology that was supposed to outpace BTC in the eyes of a few EOS believers. The EOSIO platform was released by the private company Block.one and today EOS is the seventh-largest blockchain by market cap. On February 5, 2020, a single EOS is trading for $4.49 and there is $701 million in reported 24-hour global trade volume. At today’s market prices EOS is down 80% from its ATH of $22.89 per coin.

As far as transactions per day are concerned, EOS has processed 1.7 million transactions in the last 24-hours according to Coin Metrics data. BTC has consistently held a rough average of 300,000 transactions per day since June. Despite the fact that 1.7 million per day is a lot more than BTC’s daily transaction output, skeptics estimate a great sum of EOS transactions are misleading and done by bots. Anchain.ai, an artificial intelligence security company published a report in the summer of 2019 that said a good majority of transaction volume stems from “malicious bot activity” on dapps (decentralized apps) and exchanges.

EOS is accused of the significant centralization of block producers and these entities have been scrutinized for “freezing” accounts. A great majority of block producers stem from China as well. The firm Whiteblock published a report that described the EOS chain as nothing more than a “cloud service for computation.” The EOS Reddit community has around 69,000 subscribers and the project has about 1,400 Twitter followers. This gives the project a social benchmark of around 4.4% according to crypto-economics data.

XLM — Down 92% From Its All-Time High

Stellar is a distributed ledger protocol that allows for digital currency to fiat money transfers and cross-border payments. The network is a fork of the Ripple (XRP) project and was initiated in 2014 by Jed McCaleb. Today, Stellar (XLM) is the 14th largest market cap and each XLM is trading for $0.06 per coin.

According to Coin Metric’s data, XLM has around 600,00 to 1.4 million transactions per day, which is larger than BTC’s 300,000 transactions per day average. Stellar’s social community has a 12% social benchmark with 106,000 Reddit subscribers and 280,000 Twitter followers. Similarly to XRP, the XLM chain has had its share of centralization controversies. In mid-December 2019, Stellar tried to give away 2 billion XLM, but alleged spammers made it difficult. So after they advertised the 2 billion lumen airdrop, Stellar only gave away 300 million.

A few months prior in May, Stellar’s chain stopped processing transactions for an hour. Researchers Minjeong Kim, Yujin Kwon, and Yongdae Kim predicted the outage a month before the chain halted. XLM touched an ATH at $0.93 per token and from that price point, the cryptocurrency is still down 92% today.

ADA — Down 95% From Its All-Time High

Lastly, the project Cardano (ADA) has been considered a bitcoin competitor since the project launched. ADA sees around 1-2,000 transactions per day according to Coin Metrics data. The project is a blockchain concept that was developed by Input Output Hong Kong (IOHK) and aims to offer smart contract services.

The Cardano project has a social benchmark of around 11% with 76,000 Reddit subscribers and 155,000 Twitter followers. The biggest issues people have with Cardano is the lack of usage and use cases. The community has also had difficulties in the past with the Cardano Foundation chairman. Users also complained about the time it took to develop the Daedalus wallet, as people had to store ADA on exchanges prior to its release.

ADA touched an all-time high in 2017 reaching $1.33 per coin and the asset is still down 95% from that price high. The asset saw around $32 million in 24-hour trade volume during the first week of February 2020. This month at $0.05 per ADA, the cryptocurrency is up 56% in the last year as the price sunk much lower during the crypto winter of 2018.

Overall, the data concerning these projects shows each one has certain pros and cons against BTC, but they certainly have a long way to go to even step near the biggest network’s coattails.

Do you think these four coins can compete against bitcoin? Do you consider them contenders? Let us know why you think that or what you think about this topic in the comments section below.

Disclaimer: 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. Always remember that only those in possession of the private keys are in control of the “money.” Cryptocurrency prices referenced in this article were recorded on February 5, 2020.

Images via Shutterstock, markets.Bitcoin.com, Coinmetrics, Coindesk’s social benchmark data, Fair Use, and Wiki Commons.

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Debate Ensues After 68% of BCH Hashrate Mined by Stealth Miners

31/12/2019 by Idelto Editor

2019 was known for the growing trend of stealth miners mining on the BTC and BCH network. On Dec. 30, data shows that 68% of the Bitcoin Cash network’s hashrate is being mined by mystery miners. As the year comes to an end, the large number of unknown BCH hashrate has attracted scrutiny.

Also Read: Ethereum Proponent Virgil Griffith Deemed a Flight Risk, Judge Denies Bail

68% of the BCH Hashrate Was Recently Processed by Unknown Miners

On Monday, a post on the Reddit forum r/btc explained that “untrusted hash is at nearly 70%.” The r/btc thread detailed that on Dec. 30, statistics indicate that roughly 68% of the overall BCH hashrate is being processed by miners not willing to disclose their identity. When a known mining pool finds a block, in the coinbase there’s usually a message which identifies who mined the block. However, in 2019 both SHA-256 networks BTC and BCH saw a significant increase in mystery miners processing the chains. In January, two research reports noticed the increasing trend of unknown miners as Coin Metrics and Diar both published findings on the subject. At the time, Diar’s report said that unknown miners could be “concerning” and just because the miner does not disclose its identity, it doesn’t mean the hash is not from a known pool. Coin Metrics wrote that the analytics firm also noticed a resurgence of mystery miners during the start of 2019.

A few weeks before the Bitcoin Cash upgrade that took place on Nov. 15, BCH proponents discovered 44% of the BCH hashrate was processed by unknown miners. At the time, speculators assumed the stealth hash belonged to roughly 3-4 different pools. The reason for the theory is because there are unique messages in the block’s coinbase for each unknown mining entity. Today, there are a few coinbase messages that read: “d B ^//bf Oe?D 5F” and another pool uses this message: “^//KFy{Ʊ!+.” Besides clues like the different coinbase messages, no one truly knows who is behind the unknown BCH hashrate. During the discussion on r/btc, a few individuals took issue with calling the unknown miners “untrusted.” “‘Untrusted hash’… isn’t that how it’s supposed to be?” a person asked on the Reddit forum and also left a quote from Satoshi’s white paper that said:

We have proposed a system for electronic transactions without relying on trust.

Are Stealth Miners Untrustworthy?

The Reddit user dubbed ‘Lovelyday,’ the BCH supporter who wrote the original post, responded to the critique for using the term “untrusted.” “Sure, the ‘ideal’ situation in Bitcoin would be if every miner were unknown, and Bitcoins were so valuable that there’d be absolute incentive for the majority of the hash to protect the Bitcoin that observes the economic model laid out in the white paper,” Lovelyday said. “Comparing against where we are today… we are a little ways off, with historical precedent for hashpower actually trying to destroy Bitcoin Cash — That’s why I used the term ‘untrusted’ as a blanket term for the unidentified hashrate that is > 50% — We can’t trust them, neither should we,” the Redditor added. Lovelyday further stated:

Should we trust the identified hashrate? Probably not much more, but at least we can compare their actions to their stated intentions, and hold them to account by switching to pools that act in ways we prefer.

A few other BCH supporters disagreed and stressed that the Nov. 15, 2018 hash war that created BSV was the perfect example. “A 51% attack would be extraordinarily expensive to sustain on a network as large as BCH — And it wouldn’t work because of all the miners that support us,” another individual commented on the thread. In addition to the stealth miners processing hash on the BCH network, a growing number of unknown miners are mining BTC and BSV as well. At the time of writing, BTC hashrate distribution shows 26% of the hashpower is being processed by unknown pools and there’s 30% on the BSV network today.

What do you think about the resurgence of unknown miners taking away the dominance of known mining pools? 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 ideas, concepts, content, goods or services mentioned in this article.

Image credits: Shutterstock, Pixabay, Blockchain.com, Wiki Commons, and Coin Dance.

Want to create your own secure cold storage paper wallet? Check our tools section. You can also enjoy the easiest way to buy Bitcoin online with us. Download your free Bitcoin wallet and head to our Purchase Bitcoin page where you can buy BCH and BTC securely.

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