BTC Swings Around $12,000 As Bitcoin Network Hashrate Hits All-Time High
The world’s largest cryptocurrency Bitcoin (BTC) continues to move back-and-forth around the $12,000 levels. This is for the third-time that Bitcoin has crossed $12K levels in August this month.
However, it has failed to sustain above that milestone for a long time. Over the last week, Bitcoin has been most oscillating in the range $11700-$11800. At press time, Bitcoin (BTC) is trading at a price of $12,111 with a market cap of $223 billion, as per data on WorldCoinIndex.
Another interesting development is that the Bitcoin network hashrate has hit its new historical high of 129 TH/s, as per blockchain.com.
Hashrate is basically the measure of the computing power devoted by the Bitcoin miners to mine new blocks or process Bitcoin (BTC) transactions. This jump in Bitcoin hashrate suggests that miners are having much faith in profitability. Thus, there’s always a strong co-relation between the BTC price and its hashrate.
Interestingly, the surge in the BTC price comes three months after the Bitcoin network went through its fourth halving event. Then Bitcoin halving that took place in mid-May 2020 reduced the miner rewards from 12.5 BTC to 6.25 BTC for every block of Bitcoin mined.
Last week on August 14, Nasdaq-listed crypto mining firm - Marathon Patent Group Inc - announced its partnership with mining manufacturer Bitmain. The Marathon Group has signed a long-term purchase contract for Bitmain’s next-generation S-19 Pro Miners.
As pert the contract, the Marathon Group will purchase 10,500 S-19 Pro ASIC Miners. Speaking about the new contract, Marathon’s Chief Executive Officer, Merrick Okamoto, stated: “The execution of this contract with Bitmain represents a milestone event for our company. This investment is expected to result in Marathon being one of, if not the largest, Bitcoin miner in North America.”
In the official press release, Irene Gao, Antminer Sales Director of NCSA Region, Bitmain, said: "We are pleased to have provided Marathon with Bitmain’s latest generation of Antminer S19 Pro mining hardware. Equipped with the most advanced chipset currently available, the high-performance and low power consumption of the miners will significantly improve operations of Marathon's mining business. This collaboration continues to strengthen our cooperation and will extend to future work together as Marathon expands its presence in the mining industry”.
As per the deal, Bitmain will deliver up to 1000 S-19 Pro miners by the end of November. Upon completion of the installations, the Marathon Group is likely to start generating a positive net cash flow based on the current BTC price and the hashrate difficulty.