Miners are Doubling Down into the Halving
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Miners are Doubling Down into the Halving
Network Hashrate Continues to Soar in Q4
October has been far from boring for the mining industry. The market reacted strongly to what appeared to be fake news on the Bitcoin Spot ETF approval. Hashrate keeps on soaring as miners double down during the last months before the halving. Difficult is crossing the 60T for the first time. ASIC prices are at all-time lows and miner imports into the US increased in Q3. In this week’s market analysis I will look at the following:
Bitcoin Price
Network Hashrate
Difficulty Adjustment
Hashprice
ASIC Prices
Fun Fact
News & Must Listen Podcasts
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Bitcoin Price
Last week BTC price did not respond much to the news that the SEC does not plan to appeal court decision on Grayscale ETF. However, on Monday October 16th Twitter accounts with a lot of followers like Coin Telegraph (1.3M) and Anthony Pompliano (1.6M), reported the approval of the Blackrock IShare Bitcoin Spot ETF. Price reacted strongly to what appeared to be fake news.
BTC rocketed 10% in just 12 hours but was not able to go beyond the $30k level. Despite this it is positive to see price close above the 100 SMA and 200 SMA on the daily. BTC was below these moving for the last 2 months. On the weekly timeframe BTC also moved back above the 200 SMA. These are bullish developments. More important the reaction to the fake news is a good indicator of what to expect once the BTC Spot ETF is approved and eventually launched.
Network Hashrate
The growth of the network hashrate is blowing everyone away. Hashrate started the month at 420 EH/s and reached a high of 459 EH/s last week. A 9.29% growth in 11 days! At the beginning of the year network hashrate was at 265 EH/s and 400 EH/s seemed far away. Now in Q4, 500 EH/s by the end of 2023 does not sound unrealistic.
Miners seem to be doubling down into the halving. In Q1 of this year around 80% of the network were S19 & S19J Pro models and around 15% were machines with an efficiency of over 38J/TH. After the halving many of these mid- and new generation machines will be taken offline. This means the contribution of the next generation ASICs will increase and a jump in efficiency of the overall network is to be expected after the halving.
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Difficulty Adjustment
The surge in network hashrate led to a difficulty adjustment of 6.47%. For the first time network difficulty passed the 60T mark and is now sitting at 61.03T.
Hashprice
The difficulty adjustment pushed hashprice down to $0.058/TH/Day. The increase in Bitcoin price prevented hashprice from making new lows. Currently hashprice is just below the $0.06/TH/Day. If network hashrate continues on the path it has been on during 2023, chances are high we will see hashprice going below last year’s record low. An actual approval of the ETF might be the only saviour for many miners going into the halving.
ASIC Prices
After a significant decrease, prices of new and next-generation ASICs are taking a break. The drop from the $20/TH to below $16/TH for the machines with an efficiency under 25 J/TH was likely due to two main reasons. First there was a big influx of machines during Q3 (see Fun Fact section) which means more supply is available. Second Bitmain, MicroBT and Canaan announced they are launching sub 20 J/TH machines. The outlook of more efficient machines coming to market, impacts the premium that was paid for models like the XP and M50S+.
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Fun Fact
The Miner Mag came out with another great insight on the import side of the ASIC market. Around 19 EH/s of Bitmain equipment was imported into the U.S. in Q3. It is likely that this contributed to the strong hashrate growth in October. It is probable that not all of these machines have found their way to the racks yet. This means hashrate growth might continue to soar. It will be interesting to see if imports remain high as we are about two quarters away from the halving.
Pennsylvania Lawmaker Scraps Crypto Mining Ban to Advance Energy Conservation Bill
Sandali Handagama - 17 October 2023 (CoinDesk)
A lawmaker in Pennsylvania's House of Representatives scrapped a proposed two-year moratorium on crypto mining permits from his own energy conservation bill to give it a better chance of moving forward.
Across U.S., Chinese Bitcoin Mines Draw National Security Scrutiny
Gabriel Dance - 13 October 2023 (New York Times)
When a company with Chinese origins broke ground last year on a crypto-mining operation in Cheyenne, Wyo., a team at Microsoft that assesses national security threats sounded the alarm. Not only was the site next door to a Microsoft data center that supported the Pentagon — it was about a mile away from an Air Force base that controlled nuclear-armed intercontinental ballistic missiles.
Riot, Marathon get new bear ratings as J.P.Morgan expands bitcoin-mining coverage
Max Gottlich - 11 October 2023 (Seeking Alpha)
J.P. Morgan analyst Reginald Smith on Wednesday expanded his coverage of the bitcoin mining industry, handing out Underweight ratings to Riot Platforms and Marathon Digital Holdings.
CleanSpark Gears Up for Efficiency Race with 4.4 EH/s Preorder of AntMiner S21
11 October 2023 (The Miner Mag)
CleanSpark is gearing up for an efficiency race that is poised to intensify among bitcoin mining operations ahead of the halving next year with a preorder of 4.4 EH/s in Bitmain’s newest AntMiner S21 equipment. The miners carry a valuation of $61.6 million (or $14/TH/s) and that shipments will commence in January 2024.
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