Mining hash rate has come a long way to decentralization in the last couple of years. According to the latest data on Bitcoin mining, the industry is gradually decentralizing. Bitaps took to Twitter to share this,

“Last 24 hours distribution. The mining distribution is almost such that the miner's share is no more than 10%, and, accordingly, 6 network confirmations provide complete protection against a double spend attack.”

However, the latest data from Bitaps is in conflict with that from the Blockchain.com as one crypto enthusiast pointed out in part,

“Confused about the conflicting info between different websites.”

According to Bitaps, Antpool has 12.9 percent share and 11.4 percent is acquired by BTC.com. While Blockchain.com shows 20.3 percent share of Unknown miners while Antpool has 11.4 percent and BTC.com has 16.3 percent.

Meanwhile, Chinese Bitcoin mining giant Bitmain has been reportedly facing serious issues. The news of severe layoffs and then the step down of the company’s co-CEO has been running strong in the market from about two weeks now.

According to the August report of BitMEX exchange, Bitmain has been incurring losses,

“This analysis implies Bitmain are currently loss-making, with a negative profit margin of 11.6% for the main S9 product and a margin of over negative 100% on the L3 product. In reality costs are likely to have declined so the situation may not be as bad, however, we think it is likely Bitmain are currently making significant losses.”

Bitcoin Hash Rate Making Recovery

The price of Bitcoin might not be recovering but the hash rate of Bitcoin seems to be getting back in the game after having tumultuous past six months. In December, Bitcoin hash rate took a drop of about 7 percent in a single day.

In mid-November, Bitcoin took a fall of more than 30 percent that triggered the exit of many miners. The reports of tens of thousands of bitcoin miners getting out of the market hit the industry as Bitcoin price and miners’ profits declined considerably.

Bitcoin hash rate hit its peak in October only to see a 33 percent decrease. However, it is back to its December level having recovered about 10 percent.

Source: https://www.blockchain.com/charts/hash-rate

Taking a long term view of the hash rate on the Bitcoin network, since 2016, it has been following a general uptrend. Over the years, this brought in more miners in the market while increasing the difficulty of the network.

Also, the current hash rate is still roughly three times more than January 2018’s at the same point.

Source: https://www.blockchain.com/charts/difficulty

The difficulty adjustment is also making an upward move. This mechanism exists in order to ensure that despite the price movements, the Bitcoin network always has the capacity to carry out transactions. Now, with difficulty adjustment going up means more miners are coming into the market.

With the way the leading cryptocurrency’s price, difficulty level, and the hash rate is moving, 2019 is going to be an interesting year for Bitcoin.