Even in a bear market, the Bitcoin network’s hash rate continues to trend upward, reaching 61.8 EH/s.
Hash rate is best described as the number of hash functions that are executed across a period of time. In most cases, this is measured in seconds. To get an idea of how much 61.8 EH/s is, let’s refer to the below conversions.
- 1 kH/s is 1,000 hashes per second
- 1 MH/s is 1,000,000 hashes per second
- 1 GH/s is 1,000,000,000 hashes per second
- 1 TH/s is 1,000,000,000,000 hashes per second
- 1 PH/s is 1,000,000,000,000,000 hashes per second
- 1 EH/s is 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 hashes per second
The hash rate of #bitcoin jumps to 61.8 EH/s. An increase by 35% in 2 days. pic.twitter.com/cJkuInzgVj
— A v B ⚡ (@ArminVanBitcoin) August 28, 2018
One of the strongest indicators of Bitcoin’s adoption is the upward trend of its hash rate, which the coin can attribute to two main factors: An increased number of miners and more efficient mining hardware.
For a long time, Bitcoin mining was dominated by Bitmain’s Antminers, and as more people started to see how much money was involved, they started to compete–so much so, even Kodak tried to make rentable Bitcoin miners a thing.
Some of Bitmain’s biggest competitors include Bitfury and Haolong Mining. Halong Minings newest miner, Dragonmint T1, is capable of 16 TH/s, which produces nearly 20 percent more in hash rate compared to the Antminer S9’s 14 TH/s.
From a fundamental analysis point of view–which entails evaluating an asset based on measurable factors–the Bitcoin network’s hash rate is one of the most important metrics.
Another common fundamental analysis tool used in cryptocurrency is NVT, which measures the transaction volume of a cryptocurrency.
As more research and resources pour into the Bitcoin mining space, the overall Bitcoin network can be seen to have a higher value.
Bitcoin’s Effect on the Environment
One side effect of Bitcoin mining is its impact on the environment. According to the Bitcoin energy consumption index, the Bitcoin network currently has an estimated electricity consumption level of 73.12 TWh, almost enough to power the entire country of Austria.
While this is a lot of energy, it acts as protection against 51 percent of attacks. For someone to double spend on the Bitcoin blockchain, meanwhile, they would need 51 percent of the total hashing power. This would not only require an enormous amount of energy, but an extremely dedicated hardware set up to pull off.
This ultimately gives Bitcoin the potential to be the most secure currency on Earth, and while most charts nowadays are trending downward, the Bitcoin network’s hash rate hints toward a bright future for both Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.
