Bitcoin Miners face 52.5% reward cut: Insights from the barefoot Mining CEOBitcoin’s recent decline has left many miners struggling to maintain profitability, according to Hashrate Index analyst Karan Farahmi. Although the flagship asset has already recovered to $55,000, Farahnmi noted that the present price is close to or at breakeven for most Bitcoin miners.
While several miners are struggling to maintain profitability, the major factor appears to be the cost of energy they are spending to mine Bitcoin. For miners with older machines, the recent drop in price means that their mining cost is almost at the level or even higher than the price of Bitcoin.
Bitcoin miners face falling hashprice
The hashprice of Bitcoin, which fell to an all-time low of $35/PH/Day on August 5, shows signs of a miner’s struggle. Although it has recovered and now stands at $38/PH/Day, this is still a 28% decline from the past seven days. Hashprice determines the revenue miners are expected to generate from the energy expended to mine Bitcoin rewards.
Farahani noted that this low hashprice is “placing stress on miner profitability across the industry.” The impact of the price decline is felt more strongly because Bitcoin mining difficulty increased by more than 10% last week. Higher mining difficulty combined with low prices means that miners are not having a good time, and this is reflected in the stock prices of the public miners.
Meanwhile, hashrate, the computing power available on the Bitcoin network, remained relatively stable throughout the week, falling only 1% from 644 EH/s to 638 EH/s. This suggests that the bearish market did not have much effect on miners’ operations, which could mean that mining difficulty will only decrease slightly. Farahani predicted a 2% decline in mining difficulty by the next adjustment.
Mining machines contribute to profitability challenges
The struggle for miners is also due to most mining machines performing below the breakeven point. Bitcoin mining pool f2pool pointed out that several miners using older mining equipment that consumes more energy than the newer models are now at a loss.
It said in an X post, “At a $BTC price of $54k and a power rate of $0.07/kWh, ASICs with a unit power consumption of 23 W/T or higher are operating at a loss.”
Presently, the most energy-efficient mining machine is the Antminer S21 XP Hybrid, which has a breakeven price of around $24,000. Several others are still operating at profits, such as all Antiminer S21 variants, Whatsminer models from M66S to M50S++, and Avalon models such as A1566 to A1466.
However, older machines are operating at a loss or near breakeven, with costs varying from above $56,000 for Antiminer S19j Pro+ to over $350,000 for Whatsminer M3. Although the much older machines have likely been turned off, Antimer S19 and its variants remain the most used.
