Bitcoin miners’ worst days may have passed, but a few key hurdles remain
A handful of improving metrics show profit margins slowly improving for Bitcoin miners, but key areas of the sector remain under pressure. Bitcoin’s mining industry has been relatively stable compared to the bearish price action and the tumultuous fallout of exchanges and lending companies. The network’s hashrate dipped slightly toward the end of 2022, primarily due to an unprecedented blizzard in the U.S., and has since recovered strongly to surpass its previous peak above 270 EH/s. It was particularly encouraging to see that the hashrate holding well above summer 2022 lows, despite the aftermath of FTX collapse. Bitcoin 7-day average hash rate. Source: Glassnode However, despite the recent robustness in a variety of metrics, the Mining industry faces many challenges, which will likely restrict its growth moving forward. The hurdles include low profitability, a threat from new-age efficient machines and the upcoming Bitcoin halving which will slash block rewards by half. BTC mining...