Bitcoin: a crash causes a drop in energy consumption, miners give up



[ad_1]

The mbad exodus broke out on cryptographic exchanges. Bitcoins, which cost $ 6,000 two weeks ago, are trading at less than $ 4,000. Virtually all major alternatives such as Ripple, Ethereum or Bitcoin Cash have a similar impact, behind and perhaps even ahead of it. Even the crypto-escaped Tether currency, which would be covered with US dollars and a guarantee from mining giant Bitcoin, Bitmain, must accept a discount.

There is no doubt about it: the already fragile world of digital speculation objects is currently experiencing a major new collapse. Most of the people involved see the brutal slaughter of Bitcoin Cash on Nov. 15 as an immediate trigger. Bitcoin Cash has already been separated from Bitcoin in 2017.

Such bifurcations already existed in the crypto scene. The novelty however is that the overall activity of the scene – and not just the virtual value of its badets – diminishes.

The South China Morning Post reports that in China, where most of the cryptocurrency is still operating, a number of small miners have to be abandoned. In the Chinese media, images of warehouses circulate in which the servers are being cleaned. Special mining machines are no longer profitable, even with almost free electricity.

The Bitcoin price of 6,000 USD, which was almost stable from August to mid-November, was explained by the minimal production costs at the cutting edge of technology and by the increasing long-term complexity of the computing power of Bitcoin code. The thesis: deeper than 6000 dollars, the price could not fall because nobody would propose more new bitcoins.


That's how crypto-currencies work – Explanatory video of manager-magazin.de and Mynd


But the reality is different. The new crash clearly shows that the cryptosystem is devoid of fundamental logic. The New York economist Nouriel Roubini, who has carved himself a reputation as a crypto-currency evil prophet, considers that the real value of bitcoins is less than zero because of a consumption of money. high energy, without any economic benefit.

Its fair value is not really 0; it is NEGATIVE if you impose a pollution tax on the environment on its toxic externalities. Other pollutants are out of tax-free, but they are. Only the encryption is worth NEGATIVE with a correct tax https://t.co/wWHZdhMIl8

– Nouriel Roubini (@Nouriel) November 19, 2018

In this regard, the current crash is good news. "Bloomberg" reports that the hash rate is falling, which measures the amount of computing power that miners have to recover in one second. It is not necessarily individual minors who are replaced by others who can produce even cheaper, but at least temporarily, the supply drops.

As a result, energy needs are also restored for the first time. The "Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index" currently reports an annual consumption of 54 terawatt hours of electricity for Bitcoin – still as much as Bangladesh, a country with twice as many inhabitants as Germany and the second largest great textile production in the world. But two weeks ago, the forecast was still above 73 terawatt hours, more than Austria. The drop in energy consumption indicates that many Bitcoin miners are retiring.

[ad_2]
Source link