Bitcoin Mining Difficulty Peaks as Bitcoin Price Falls

Bitcoin Mining Difficulty Peaks as Bitcoin Price Falls. Bitcoin difficulty hit an all-time high of 90.67 trillion hashes on Wednesday. A hash is a mathematical function performed by Bitcoin miners as part of the process of securing the blockchain. The higher the difficulty, the more computing power and energy required to complete the job. Nishant Sharma, founder of BlocksBridge Consulting, a communications and research firm for the bitcoin mining industry, told Decrypt that the record-high difficulty "significantly reduces the profitability of publicly traded mining companies. He said, "[The difficulty] is forcing them to either look for new revenue streams or double down on their bitcoin investments in anticipation of a bull market."