- Bitcoin saw a surge in activity caused by the popularity of Inscriptions and Ordinals.
- Miners’ earnings could get a boost due to increased activity; however, increasing difficulty presented a challenge.
Bitcoin [BTC] has experienced significant volatility in recent months, with the price fluctuating between $25,000 and $30,000. This volatility has understandably made many risk-averse investors cautious.
Amidst this uncertainty, there has been a notable increase in activity on the Bitcoin network, raising questions about the possible implications for the king coin.
Have Ordinals played an important role?
The spike in network activity can be partly attributed to the growing popularity of inscriptions and ordinal numbers. These developments have facilitated the integration of NFTs on the Bitcoin network.
While the initial hype around Bitcoin NFTs may have died down, recent indications have suggested a renewed interest in these digital assets. The renewed interest in NFTs likely contributed to increased network activity as users explored the potential of NFTs on the Bitcoin blockchain.
Source: Dune analysis
Consequences for miners
The increased network activity is expected to benefit miners’ earnings, which have experienced a decline over the past month. Declining miner income usually puts selling pressure on Bitcoin.
However, the increased network activity and transaction costs may offset this trend by providing miners with improved revenue streams.
Source: Blockchain.com
Either way, the rising difficulty of Bitcoin mining could pose a threat to the miners. When the difficulty of mining increases, miners face several negative consequences. They may receive lower rewards due to lower mining success rates, leading to reduced profitability.
In addition, higher difficulty requires more computational power and energy consumption, resulting in higher operational costs. The increasing difficulty also attracts more miners, increasing competition and reducing individual chances of earning rewards.
Source: Blockchain.com
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At the time of writing, BTC was trading at $27,088, with price and trading volume showing significant volatility over the past month. Despite the market swings, the Open Interest for Bitcoin indicated that traders remained willing to bet on BTC’s future.
The continued level of Open Interest suggested that traders were not put off by the high volatility, but saw it as an opportunity for potential profits.
Source: Sentiment
