BTC Miners Experience Worst Revenue Month Since September 2023

Bitcoin (BTC) miners experienced their lowest revenue month since September 2023 in August, due to a decrease in the number of coins mined. Last month, their revenue reached $827.56 million, a decline of over 10.5% compared to$927.35 million in July, but an increase of 5% relative to August 2023, according to Bitbo data.

Meanwhile, concerns are rising within the crypto community about the increasing centralization of Bitcoin, which some fear could undermine the fundamental principles of the flagship cryptocurrency. Recent data by BTC.com shows that two mining pools, Foundry USA and AntPool, now control about 57% of the total Bitcoin Network hashrate.

A Substantial Drop

The August figures represent a 57% drop compared to the peak experienced this past March where they were just under $1.93 billion, coinciding with Bitcoin experiencing an all-time high of over $73,500 on March 13th. This is the lowest revenue month for Bitcoin miners since September 2023 when they earned $727.79 million while Bitcoin was priced around $25,000.

Monthly revenues for Bitcoin miners have been on the decline throughout 2024 after reaching a peak in March. The number of BTC mined also saw a slight decrease, falling to 13,843 BTC last month compared to 14,725 BTC in July.

The Main Reason

The decline in revenue is attributed to decreased transaction volumes and increased mining difficulty, which was exacerbated by the Bitcoin halving in April that reduced rewards by 50% to 3.125 BTC. In August, median fees accounted for 2% of a block reward, and the 30-day average of daily confirmed transactions reached a year-to-date high of nearly 631,648 on July 31st before falling to 594,871 by August 31st.

According to Bitbo and Blockchain.com data, mining difficulty also continued to rise, reaching an all-time high of 89.47 trillion in August compared to 86.87 trillion in July. As a result of increased difficulty and lower profitability, some miners have shifted their computing power to artificial intelligence (AI) projects, with some agreements generating billions of dollars.