Less Than 15,000 Blocks to Halving: ETF Hopes and Ordinal Inscriptions Serve as Life Preserver for Bitcoin Miners

9 months ago

As of Jan. 9, 2024, less than 15,000 blocks stay earlier the 4th Bitcoin halving event. This milestone volition halve the artifact reward from 6.25 to 3.125 bitcoins per block. Expected to hap successful April 2024, this lawsuit volition render bitcoin progressively scarce. However, it whitethorn exert sizeable unit connected miners, seeing their net chopped by 50% pursuing the halving.

2 Key Trends Buoy Miners Ahead of 2024 Milestone

The Bitcoin halving event is approaching and is estimated to beryllium conscionable implicit 100 days away, assuming artifact times support their mean of 10 minutes. Current statistics, arsenic of this writing, bespeak that 14,981 blocks stay until the halving.

This upcoming lawsuit marks the 4th halving; the archetypal occurred connected Nov. 28, 2012, followed by the 2nd connected July 9, 2016, and the 3rd connected May 11, 2020. Before these halving epochs, particularly preceding the 2016 and 2020 events, definite skeptics of bitcoin predicted a ‘mining decease spiral’ accompanied by important miner capitulation.

In the past, bitcoin detractors person claimed that a mining decease spiral could hap post-halving owed to reduced artifact rewards. They reason that this alteration successful profitability whitethorn pb to miners exiting the web en masse, resulting successful a driblet successful hashing power, slower transaction times, and imaginable information vulnerabilities, frankincense destabilizing the full Bitcoin network.

However, a 2020 research study by Coinshares dismissed these concerns arsenic “highly theoretical borderline cases without immoderate humanities real-world precedent.” As the 2024 halving nears, these once-prominent theoretical concerns person importantly diminished.

Up to this point, 2 cardinal developments person enhanced the net of bitcoin miners: the anticipation of a U.S. spot bitcoin exchange-traded money (ETF) support and the burgeoning Ordinal inscription trend. Mining gross saw a important emergence passim 2023 and this inclination has persisted into the caller year.

The affirmative sentiment surrounding the potential approval of a spot bitcoin ETF has boosted BTC’s value, consequently expanding the network’s hash price. The surge successful activity, coupled with the popularity of Ordinal inscription minting, has importantly raised transaction fees. If these trends persist, miners mightiness not acquisition a important interaction from these changes.

Although existent fees are little than past month, they stay notably higher than the aforesaid play past year. The imaginable support of an ETF has led crypto enthusiasts to expect important request for bitcoin from these publically traded funds, perchance maintaining BTC’s precocious terms for an extended period.

As with erstwhile halvings, the result remains uncertain, and bitcoin miners person historically operated nether choky conditions. However, large mining operations with important superior are scaling up their hashrate importantly by acquiring thousands of advanced mining rigs.

With these much efficient miners and accrued hashrate outputs, coupled with the imaginable terms enactment from an ETF and higher fees owed to inscriptions, bitcoin miners are expected to stay resilient, akin to their acquisition during the past 3 halving events.

What bash you deliberation astir the upcoming Bitcoin halving event? Share your thoughts and opinions astir this taxable successful the comments conception below.

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