Bitcoin Cash and BSV Hash Rates Surge Following BTC Halving

The Bitcoin Cash and Bitcoin SV hash rates have recovered following a dramatic fall after their halvings in April, as the Bitcoin hash rate declined since the May 11 halving.

According to bitinfocharts, Bitcoin Cash’s hash rate increased more than 90%, from 1.43 Exahashes/second (EH/s) on May 10 to 2.74 EH/s on May 13. The hash rate of BSV also grew from 1.1 EH/s to 1.78 EH/s.

BCH and BSV pre-halving and post-BTC halving. Source: bitinfocharts.com

Miners flee following halvings

Both BCH and BSV experienced a steep drop in mining immediately following their rewards halvings on April 8 and April 10, respectively. BCH’s hash rate fell more than 80% in the two days after the block rewards fell from 12.5 to 6.25 BCH. BSV also saw a reduction in hash rate as miners moved their computing power to the BTC chain.

BTC hash rate rising around BCH and BSV halvings. Source: bitinfocharts.com

Following the April halvings, BTC blocks were some of the most profitable for crypto mining operations. In the lead up to this week’s BTC halving, there were predictions miners with less efficient rigs would shut their machines down as revenue fell. 

So far, the BTC hash rate has declined 24% — from 137 EH/s pre-halving to 104 EH/s — but not quite to the extent that BCH and BSV did after their halvings. BTC has seen longer block production times too.

F2pool, the miner responsible for the NY Times headline contained in the final BTC block extracted before the halving, said its figures show the hashrate had dropped from roughly 120 EH/s to 100 EH/s.

Shifting back to BCH and BSV

The percentage of miner revenue coming from fees is currently low for BSV. However,  transactions of the BSV network have hit around 88% of the total of those done on the Bitcoin chain, and 54% of the number of crypto transactions, overall on May 13. Critics argue the transactions are mostly writing data. 

Miners like f2pool have noticed how BSV is more profitable than BTC at the moment: “BTC mining revenue is slightly behind BSV, but slightly higher than BCH.” However, it noted, “the mining revenue of Bitcoin Cash and Bitcoin SV usually remains very close to the mining revenue of Bitcoin.”

Miners also receive some revenue from transaction fees, which are increasing on BTC, while those for BSV and BCH have largely been unaffected by either halving, remaining a fairly constant 0.0002 USD and 0.002 USD, respectively, since mid-April.

BSV representative Ed Pownall took a shot at Bitcoin’s fees, telling Cointelegraph the average transaction fee for BTC peaked at $3.19 prior to the halving, but “May 11 saw 1.2 BTC processed at block height 630001—with a transaction fee of close to $100.”

Pownall argued these fees are not the result of new users adopting Bitcoin but rather a form of price gouging or surge pricing: “It’s a sign the BTC network reached its imposed limits governing how well it can serve its community.”