Crypto Mining Giant Bitmain Reports 88% Decline in Bitcoin Mining Power

Beijing-based crypto mining rig manufacturing giant, Bitmain, recently reported that its internal Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash mining operations have generated 88% less computing power compared to a month ago. The major cutdown has been revealed by the company in its monthly hashing power disclosure.

As per the hashing power disclosure, on May 7th, the hash rate of all Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash mining hardware which are running on the SHA265 chips has dropped significantly. Comparing on a monthly basis, the combined hash rate of the company was at 2,072 hashes per second (PH/s) which had fallen 88% to just 237.29 quadrillion PH/s.

Bitmain is pushing the edges of computing power by developing top-tier crypto mining chips. Bitmain is also the market leader in the development of integrated circuits specific to cryptocurrency mining and mining hardware under the Antminer brand. It also operates two of the largest crypto mining pools called Antpool.com and BTC.com.

Bitmain has started disclosing the monthly hash rate of the mining hardware it owns since July last year. checking out the hash report of that month available online, the hash rate was 1,692 PH/s that month, and then increased to 2,339 PH/s in October. In March, the company reported the figure dropped below 1,700 PH/s which was the result of a steep decline in Bitcoin price. However, it recovered slightly in April before falling down significantly. Bitmain’s stake on the Bitcoin network’s total computing power has also reduced to 0.4% from 4%.

Having all the hashing power coming from the more widely used AntMiner S9 (with each having a hash rate of 14 Tera hashes per second (TH/s)), the company has stopped operating more than 130,00 mining hardware to mine for itself. The cutback might also be the result of the new trend in China where miners have started relying more on cheap hydroelectric power. Bitmain is also planning to put $80 million worth of mining machines on work which will reportedly run on hydroelectric power.

Such a whopping decline in computing power doesn’t initially mean that the company has ceased all its mining equipment and shut down all or any operations. In contrast to Bitcoin, the hash rate of Bitcoin Cash network has been steady around 2,000 to 2,500 PH/s since early this year.

“It is [in the] natural course of the mining business where the hash rate owned by one body at one instant may be owned by someone else at another instant,” Bitmain spokesperson stated.