Bitcoin’s price is still stuck in a tight range, but it has never been more difficult to mine the world’s largest crypto asset than it is now. Its network fundamentals paint a clear bullish picture.
According to data from BTC.com, Bitcoin mining difficulty increased this week to 50.68 trillion, setting a new all-time high.
The latest difficulty adjustment occurred at block 792,288, which increased by 3.4% on May 31. This is the first time Bitcoin has recorded a difficulty level above the 50 trillion mark.
Further validating miner trust and competition is the network’s hash rate, which is hovering near an all-time high of 400 EH/s.
Foundry USA leads the market share of the highest hash rate with 28.9%. Next is Antpool with 22.6%, ranked third is F2Pool with 14.1%.
The rise is a welcome respite for Bitcoin miners after suffering so much due to the market turmoil last year.
For instance, the recent Ordinals craze has helped network miners by increasing transaction fees.
In fact, daily mining revenue hit a five-year high last month in a rare event.
Due to the popularity of Ordinals, miners are now deploying more and more mining machines, thus increasing the computing power of the network.
Meanwhile, most Bitcoin mining-related stocks in the United States posted gains this week as President Joe Biden agreed to eliminate the 30% tax on miners.
Riot Platforms led the way in big mining stocks, followed by Iris Energy, Hive Blockchain, Cleanspark, Hut 8 Mining and Marathon Digital Holding.