Bitcoin Mining Difficulty Drops While BTC Slips Below USD 10K Again

Following a month of rising Bitcoin (BTC) mining difficulty, the first adjustment in September saw the difficulty drop – though it still remains at the second-highest level in the network’s history.

Bitcoin mining difficulty, or the measure of how hard it is to compete for mining rewards, dropped 1.21% today, but it was not enough for it to drop out of the 17 T level. It’s now sitting at 17.35 T.

The all-time high was reached just last adjustment, at the end of August, thanks to a rise of 3.6%.

Bitcoin’s price has also dropped in the past week from the USD 12,000 it shortly touched again at the very beginning of this month. Holding the USD 11,000 level for a couple of days, it then fell below it on September 3, which was followed by a steep decline, and even a brief dip below USD 10,000 two days later. It’s currently (13:12 UTC), trading at USD 9,926. It dropped by 3% in a day and 15% in a week.

Meanwhile, the hashrate, or the computational power of the network, has gone up nearly 2% since the previous adjustment, as the 7-day simple moving average shows: from 122 E on August 24 to 124.43 E recorded yesterday.

The mining difficulty of Bitcoin is adjusted every two weeks (or more precisely, every 2016 blocks) to maintain the normal 10-minute block time. According to Bitinfocharts.com, it has been moving between 8 and 11 minutes since the previous adjustment, standing around 9 minutes yesterday.

Meanwhile, miners have turned to saving bitcoin again. According to data from data from ByteTree, miner had been offloading far more bitcoin than they mine. As reported just four days ago, bitcoin miners sold 63% more coins than they generated in a day.

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Learn more:
Bitcoin Hashrate Might Double In a Year, Pressing Miners’ Margins
‘Exclusive Mining’ Can Be Used for Money Laundering & Tax Evasion – Report