As July unfolded, Bitcoin’s mining returns nudged upward by 2%, coinciding with a notable 7% ascent in the cryptocurrency’s price and a 5% climb in the network hashrate, according to a Friday research brief released by investment bank Jefferies.
Jonathan Petersen, the report’s analyst, highlighted that “the bullish BTC price trend spells good news for Galaxy’s (GLXY) digital asset arm, even as miners grapple with an escalating network hashrate.”
Decoding Hashrate: The Pulse of Mining Competition
Serving as a barometer of the mining landscape’s competitiveness and challenge intensity, the hashrate aggregates the total computational might dedicated to mining and verifying transactions within a proof-of-work blockchain. This measure is expressed in exahashes per second (EH/s), underscoring the sheer processing force at work.
Mining Output and Market Share Shifts
The report indicates a rise in production by U.S.-registered mining enterprises, which extracted 3,622 bitcoins in July — up from 3,379 in June. These players represented a 26% slice of the entire network’s mining output, a slight uptick from 25% the previous month.
Top Miners Stealing the Spotlight
IREN (IREN) emerged as July’s leading bitcoin miner with a haul of 728 coins, closely tailed by MARA Holdings (MARA) tallying 703 BTC, Jefferies pointed out.
Compact Statistical Insight: Globally, the Bitcoin network’s hashrate has consistently hovered around 320-350 EH/s throughout July 2023, marking a steady increase from roughly 300 EH/s the year before. This relentless growth mirrors intensifying competition and technological upgrades among miners.
Hashrate Leadership and Revenue Dynamics
Jefferies underscored MARA’s dominant position, boasting the heftiest energized hashrate at 58.9 EH/s as July closed, with CleanSpark (CLSK) trailing as the sector’s runner-up at 50 EH/s.
Notably, the revenue generated per exahash per second ascended as well. Petersen noted, “a theoretical mining fleet wielding 1 EH/s would have pulled in approximately $57,000 per day last month, edging up from around $56,000 in June and surging past $50,000 a year earlier.”