Thursday, March 25, 2021

Bitcoin Origin - The Genesis Block - SOG Genesis Card

Birth Of The Bitcoin Blockchain

Genesis Card - Birth Of The Bitcoin Blockchain

Issued : Sunday July 05 2015 , Epic card. Heal all

In Circulation : 557  

Card Description : This is where it all began, the Genesis Block, source of all Askian's secrets and wealth but also cause of greed. Now, it's up to history to be written...

Spells Of Genesis artist, have given us the conception of an alien source in the creation of Bitcoin. Wouldn't that be great! The Byzantine generals problem was insolvable until Satoshi Nakamoto, whose identity is still unknown, mined the Genesis block and birth the Bitcoin Blockchain.

In total 1000 cards were created but 443 were burnt. This card is divisible which was a mistake on SOG part as it created a situation where some people bought fractions of the card from the Counterparty DEX. Although 557 cards is the maximum number in existence. The true number will never be known as like Bitcoin owners may have lost passwords or keys.

Legally Everdream Soft owns the copyright to the image, even though others may own copies of the card. The situation is similar to owning a limited edition copy of a book.

For what it represents, The Genesis Card is truly a collectors item. Like a limited edition copy of the "Mona Lisa" this NFT was issued by Everdream Soft on Sunday July 05 2015 to commemorate the birth of the Bitcoin blockchain. There will never be anymore of this special issue.

__________________________________________________________

The Marketplace

We could always trade NFT tokens on the Counterparty DEX, Open Seas, Counterparty dispensers to name a few, but these are not well supported and not real places for price discovery as Theo Goodman proved when he auctioned an FDCARD for $45,000 on 21 March 2021 in his telegram channel @NFTAUCTIONS.

The FDCARD was the first card released by Everdream Soft and it was not related to the Bitcoin story. It was to support a project to reward participants who donated idle CPU time towards crunching protein folding algorithms for curing diseases. We can look at it as a proof of concept exercise. Still it fetch $45,000 as it was the first known institutionalised NFT. Prior to this it had also traded for $20k on a Counterparty dispenser perhaps in anticipation of the auction. Theo Goodman's auctions made the jump from hobbyist to serious collectors for Tokenised NFTs, in part due to the current intense interest in NFTs and also promotion of his auctions on Twitter and other social networks.

The hunt is now on for an NFT to memorialised and immortalised the birth of the Bitcoin Blockchain. As humans beings we have this need to discover and mark a source for posterity. The Genesis Card from Everdream Soft seems to be a likely candidate. 

Depicting it as a manifestation from an unknown alien source conjures up thought provoking emotions of  mystery, adventure and excitement. Time will tell.

The value of an NFT is not set in stone. It is not guaranteed. It is worth only as much as what the next person is willing to pay for it. NFTs issued by celebrities may have value but will certainly fall in value as their popularity fades. NFTs depicting great work of art together with copyright ownership will hold value. 

NFTs issued by Everdream Soft, Spells Of Genesis series telling the Bitcoin story will always be in demand because they were the first and were made when nobody thought anything of it. It was not clear then that Bitcoin or the blockchain could even survive. Early adopters like early Bitcoin adopters are mostly just lucky if they still retain ownership of their Tokens!

It would be interesting to see how much the Genesis Card would fetch at auction if one was offered. The rarity of a card is not the arbiter of value. It is what it represents. It is history. It is prestige. It is the comfort of ownership. Ultimately it is demand. Price is discovered when supply meets demand. Always have and always will.

The value of an NFT could also be tied to access. Because ownership can be proven it could be used for invitation to events. Imagine a gathering only open to owners of a particular NFT. There will be other benefits we can't even imagine for now but these attributes make them different from Bitcoin and other Store of value tokens. NFTs can have intrinsic value baked into the design. 

__________________________________________________________

Blockchain History

Satoshi Nakamoto mined the Genesis Block on January 3 2009. This started the Bitcoin blockchain and the whole blockchain revolution. Embedded in the block was the message " The Times 03/Jan/2009 Chancellor On Brink of Second Bailout For Banks " Many people interpreted this as Satoshi's intention for bitcoin to replace Cash. ( In depth article on the Genesis Block by Daniel Phillips - Decrypt )

Why was this revolutionary? 

Up until then anyone could make an exact copy of anything digital. However if we embedded that digital information in a Bitcoin block, it is time stamped and that information can never be altered in any way. If we encoded a very large file and stored the encryption code in the blockchain, it will prove that we have the original copy of the file because changing anything in that file, even a comma would result in a different hash. It is this property that was so revolutionary and was credited as solving the Byzantine General's problem. This discovery is worthy of a Nobel Prize. We can even embed code in the blockchain which enables us to create self executing contracts. ( Smart Contracts )

From this beginning different types of  blockchains, private, public, proof of work, proof of stake and more have been created to solve specific problems. Everything we do, from supply lines, finance, identity and more will be recorded on a blockchain.  By enabling micro payments at scale, the internet of things will become a reality. Things can transact! Your fridge can order and pay for your groceries all by itself.

__________________________________________________________

The Origin Story

The Bitcoin whitepaper was first published by Satoshi Nakamoto on October 31 2008 and the Genesis Block was mined on January 3 2009. Rather than 10 minutes there was a 6 day gap between the genesis block and the next block. Also interesting is that the block rewards from the Genesis Block ( Block 0 ) can never be spent.

Let us take a step back. What are the necessary steps and conditions before we can even begin the process of mining the first block? We know that this was a garage type operation as no large organisation have ever claimed responsibility and in the early days you could mine Bitcoins on a laptop.

As far as we know, the only account of Bitcoin genesis was recounted in this Craig Wright interview. 

The Genesis Block ( time 30.36 )

1) The genesis block was inputed directly into the code.

2) There was 69 machines running Bitcoin code at his home and on a farm in a cowshed 3 hours travel time apart.

3) Window's "patch Tuesday" was the reason for the gap between the genesis block and the first block and it took the six days to get the system up and running again.

Most of what he describes and claimed can and should be verified, if we are serious in getting to the truth. Was the first blocks mined in Australia at that location? Did he buy 69 computers? Did he buy those Window licences. Why offer "patch Tuesday" as the reason for the 6 day gap unless he actually lived it? ( Some have even suggested that it was a religious thing, that God created the universe in 7 days ). The Genesis Block was coded into the software on Monday. His system started running and Windows upgrade happened. Blocks went out of sync and he had to fix and restart. The Genesis block did not changed because it was hard coded, which explained the 6 day gap. 

There was an argument put forward that January's 2009 patch was released on 13 January 2009 after the Genesis block on 3 January 2009. Someone could explain the difference between patch Tuesday releases and updates and how they were rolled out in different countries. I presume December patches are updated in January and Microsoft have been known to rush or pull patches as they see fit.


We live in a time when lies are presented as truth and people believe them. Many people believe that this man Dorian Nakamoto is Satoshi even though he himself denies it. He is even presented in Wikipedia as Satoshi Nakamoto!



Unless someone else offer another explanation Craig Wright's account is the best we have for the Genesis Block. I will be happy to include that narrative here as well. It will make the topic all the more interesting. Whether we like Craig or not does not matter, the truth matters and truth does have a habit of surfacing.

The Genesis Card and The Genesis Block.

With all the history and back history associated with Bitcoin, link to the The Genesis Card every time we see that surreal and alien like image, it conjures up emotions in us about the myth and mysteries surrounding the Birth Of  Bitcoin.



Related Articles

Non Fungible Tokens. NFTs. The Ultimate Store Of Value


Other Cards

The Stealing Of Mt Gox - GOXCARD

First Bitcoin Fork - Blocksizecd

The Immitator  Satoshilite


Note : Please feel free to contribute in the comments to improve this page and to use, for promoting your sales.

Monday, March 22, 2021

Non Fungible Tokens (NFT's) The Ultimate Store Of Value

NFT's are all the rage today and nearly everyman (woman) and his dog is or is trying to get in on this phenomenon. A Banksy art was purchased digitised, and turned into a NFT . The original was burnt. It sold for $380,000 in eth. Artists, celebrities, musicians are flocking to cash in by turning their creations into NFTs.

Even Elon Musk is getting in on the act selling his own NFT - A song about NFT!

What Is An NFT?

An NFT is basically a digital file on a blockchain and is therefore verifiably time stamped and immutable, provided it is embedded into a public distributed blockchain. ( BTC, ETH, Cosmos, Polkadot ... )

The first NFT was known as a token and in those days and was issued on a project called Counterparty (XCP) on the Bitcoin blockchain. Anyone can create one or any number of copies of a token using the counterparty dapp. The first SOG token (NFT) was the FDCARD issued by Everdream Soft, as a game card in their turn based game called Spells Of Genesis. 

Because a Counterparty transaction is still a transaction on the BTC blockchain, Counterparty fell into disuse as the cost of BTC transactions escalated. It has now made a comeback especially as the value of these NFT cards start attaining ever higher values.

The FDCARD also known as "The Healing Formula"


Folding coin participants earned these FDCARD by merged folding starting in March 2015 until May when all 300 were "mined" and distributed proportionally to the work units completed by participants who ran the Folding at Home model to help find cures for cancer, Alzheimer, diabetes etc

Starting Price $5000 

THE FIRST SOG CARD !
VINTAGE
RARE


The NFT Auctions

Enter Theo Goodman. He started a telegram community @nftauctions where he took it upon himself to auction off any transferable NFTs. It is a simple model based on trust. Sellers send him the NFT to hold in escrow. The successful buyer would send him the money (Btc) and he would forward on this payment less his commission. The first auction was mainly Pepe memes but the second auction contained the above FDCARD which sold for $45,000 and a SATOSHI LITE card which sold for $3300. Is it real? You can scroll up to see the results of the auction Lot17 21 March 2021 @nftauctions.

There are other marketplaces for NFTs such as the DEX on Counterparty in Freewallet, Open Seas, Uptick and more but this is the very first auction for NFTs where there is probably real price discovery and interest being generated from Twitter network

What this suggests is that there is real demand for Spells Of Genesis NFTs because it started the tokenisation trend, It tells the story of Bitcoin and the Blockchain. 

The most sought after card being The Satoshicard


Only 200 copies and it is arguably iconic for Bitcoin and the Blockchain. This card sold for $6000 back in 2016, with fractions of it selling for up to $27,000. It was a quirk that this card was divisible and some people bought fractions of the card thus destroying its' value. Small fraction owners can therefore hold to ransom the owner of the majority part of the card!

The Genesis Card 


Representing the First Bitcoin block mined and the birth of the Bitcoin Blockchain.

GOX Card


Representing the story of the very first Bitcoin Exchange, Mt Gox, its hack. The saga continues to this days with liquidators and claimants still fighting over the "carcass".

Battle For Blocksize


Representing the very bitter fight within the community which led to the Bitcoin Cash fork.


Satoshi Lite also known as The Imposter


Charlie Lee, inventor of Litecoin, ask Shaban to portray himself as The Imitator. This card sold at the NFT auction for $3300.


What gives an NFT value?

Like anything else including Bitcoin it is Usefulness, Adoption and Scarcity. Bitcoin (Btc) has an advantage over gold in that it is easier to use as a medium of exchange without the cost of storage.

NFTs that represents digital art are valued because of the beauty of the artwork and/or the reputation of the artist. Most importantly the copyright of that image belongs to the token holder. In future, it will be paid to the token holder through the blockchain without the owner ever needing to do anything about it. 

NFTs can also be issued by celebrities, artists and musicians, the value of which depends on their following. Yes songs can also be digitised and made into and NFT. These are collectibles and they include Pepe tokens the main items being auction at @nftauctions. It is only worth what someone will pay for it and its' value can go up or down.

Game Card NFTs in addition to being collectibles, are useful for their attributes in a game. The bigger the community playing the game  the higher the demand and therefore value. Crypto Kitties, and SOG cards are examples.

A Special Place For Spells Of Genesis NFTs.

This is my opinion only and I believe that Some Spell Of Genesis NFTs especially those that tell the Bitcoin and Blockchain story and are issued in limited quantities between 2015 and 2016 will fetch very high value. ( See list of all cards here. )

The artwork is tasty, meaningful and professional and they are in limited supply. Satoshicard is only limited to 200 copies and who knows how many copies have already been lost. They are rarer than lambos. 

The value fetch by FDCARD at @nftauctions of $45,000 and $3300 for SATOSHI LITE on 21 March 2021 is proof that these SOG NFT cards will be very sought after. Like Bitcoin (BTC) they were there first. They can be dated back to 2015, and there will never be anymore of them.

Is this a flash in the pan? There will be another auction on April 3 and the new auction lot is being put up for inspections now. I believe that this will be an ongoing event very much reminiscent of the early days of Bitcoin when BTC was traded on message boards and chatrooms all on trust. No doubt it will be formalised and professionalised in the near future.

As these eye popping prices keep rising, there will be more interest and we will have a huge positive feedback loop.

What can an NFT be used for ?

1) Commemorate an event 

2) Represent   a digital artwork

3) Copyright ownership of an artwork

4) Ticketing access to clubs, events and such

5) Prestige of ownership if disclosed

6) Store of value

7) It is not a cryptocurrency

Store of value depends on all the attributes above and more perhaps. An NFT Card has only X number of copies in existence. It is of value to the people who played a part in the event. Gox card represents such an event.

A card like the Genesis Card represents the birth of Bitcoin and thus will have wide interest even to people not particularly interested in Cryptocurrencies.

A card like Satoshicard was the apex card even among SOG enthusiast then. The fact that it depicted a mysterious like character " Yoda Like " makes it even more appealing even if we eventually agree on who Satoshi really is.

It is not a cryptocurrency and this is important. Blockchain tokens are always increasing and decreasing in value. Even if the price of BTC collapses a quality NFT will hold its' value. This is important for those holding crypto to hedge their risk of ownership.

This market is huge and this fact has not really sunk in. FDCARD sold for $45,000 and by extension total FDCARD value is $13.50 million. This places it at no 845 ( Coin Gecko)  by market capitalisation, and it is only 1 Card in the SOG stable. Clearly this is a new asset class and deserves a ranking category all on its' own.

The future is bright for NFTs.


Appendix

Counterparty : https://www.coingecko.com/en/coins/counterparty

Everdream Soft : Company owned by Shaban Shaame a Swiss national. SOG was build on his original card role playing game called MOONGA.

Spells Of Genesis : Turn based game using attribute cards.


FDCARD Bidding History

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:02]

BOOM

Zaafar, [21.03.21 12:02]

5000

Mysterious Aesthetic, [21.03.21 12:02]

$10k

Xcer, [21.03.21 12:02]

11111

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:02]

xcer

Rob, [21.03.21 12:02]

$12k

Xcer, [21.03.21 12:02]

15

Dave, [21.03.21 12:02]

$12.5

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:02]

15k next bid 16k

Xcer, [21.03.21 12:02]

$15


Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:03]

[ ✊ Sticker ]


Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:03]

do I hear 16k?

Rob, [21.03.21 12:03]

$16k

-, [21.03.21 12:03]

18

Xcer, [21.03.21 12:03]

$17k

Xcer, [21.03.21 12:03]

$20k

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:03]

V top bidder

Rob, [21.03.21 12:03]

$19k

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:03]

xcer 20k

-, [21.03.21 12:03]

25

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:03]

25

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:03]

26k ?

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:03]

[ ✊ Sticker ]

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:04]

[ 👊 Sticker ]


Rob, [21.03.21 12:04]

$26k

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:04]

26k!

got it all offalick 🫀, [21.03.21 12:04]

26.5

-, [21.03.21 12:04]

28

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:04]

28

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:04]

V

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:04]

[ ✊ Sticker ]

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:04]

28 top bid v

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:04]

29

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:04]

29k?

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:05]

[ 👊 Sticker ]

White Rabbit1111, [21.03.21 12:05]

29

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:05]

[ 🤜 Sticker ]

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:05]

29k

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:05]

!

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:05]

[ ✊ Sticker ]

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:05]

do I hear 30k

-, [21.03.21 12:05]

30

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:05]

31k?

got it all offalick 🫀, [21.03.21 12:05]

31

White Rabbit1111, [21.03.21 12:05]

31

White Rabbit1111, [21.03.21 12:05]

32

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:05]

32 white

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:05]

33?

-, [21.03.21 12:05]

35

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:05]

36?

Mysterious Aesthetic, [21.03.21 12:05]

😳

got it all offalick 🫀, [21.03.21 12:06]

[In reply to -]

Sheeesh

White Rabbit1111, [21.03.21 12:06]

36

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:06]

no comments just bids ,thanks

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:06]

36k !

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:06]

[ ✊ Sticker ]

Fredrick, [21.03.21 12:06]

37k

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:06]

38k?

-, [21.03.21 12:06]

40

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:06]

40k!

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:06]

do I hear 41k

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:06]

[ ✊ Sticker ]

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:06]

[ 👊 Sticker ]

White Rabbit1111, [21.03.21 12:06]

41

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:06]

41

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:07]

do I hear 42k

-, [21.03.21 12:07]

42

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:07]

43?

got it all offalick 🫀, [21.03.21 12:07]

43

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:07]

43

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:07]

44?

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:07]

going once

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:07]

[ ✊ Sticker ]

White Rabbit1111, [21.03.21 12:07]

44

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:07]

44

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:07]

[ ✊ Sticker ]

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:07]

[ 👊 Sticker ]

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:07]

[ 🤜 Sticker ]

-, [21.03.21 12:07]

45

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:07]

45k

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:07]

do I hear 46k?

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:07]

[ ✊ Sticker ]

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:08]

[ 👊 Sticker ]

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:08]

[ 🤜 Sticker ]

Theo Goodman, [21.03.21 12:08]

[ 🔥 Sticker ]   ( Sold for 45K )


Comments thereafter

Flubito, [21.03.21 12:08]

[ 😰 Sticker ]

MemeConscious 😷, [21.03.21 12:08]

[ 🌜 Sticker ]

mnl Classic Positive Vibes, [21.03.21 12:08]

[ 😔 Sticker ]

Wheeler, [21.03.21 12:08]

V wanted it

Zaafar, [21.03.21 12:08]

STEEAALL

MrHansel, [21.03.21 12:08]

Wooooooowwew

Shaban Spells of Genesis, [21.03.21 12:08] ( Owner of Everdream Soft and SOG game )

Woa

KEKRELOADED, [21.03.21 12:08]

[ GIF ]

Ryan Haigh, [21.03.21 12:08]

wowwwww

White Rabbit1111, [21.03.21 12:08]

[ 👏 Sticker ]

Rob, [21.03.21 12:08]

Moon

Wheeler, [21.03.21 12:08]

[ 💫 Sticker ]

Akshar, [21.03.21 12:08]

Gah le

Dave, [21.03.21 12:08]

Congrats


Other Cards

Bitcoin Origins - Genesis Card

The Stealing Of Mt Gox - GOXCARD

First Bitcoin Fork - Blocksizecd

The Immitator  Satoshilite


Note : Please feel free to contribute in the comments to improve this page and to use, for promoting your sales.


Saturday, May 16, 2020

Return Of The Bitcoin Chain Death Spiral.

Bitcoin mining is an economic activity. Miners will stop mining if it is unprofitable. The only exception is mining on the BCH and BSV chain where the supporters are mining to support the chain and are basically holding on to the coin for future profits. This happened in the case of BSV when the coin increased in price from $45 to $190 today. Doing the same on BTC at $9000 is not that easy.

To maintain current price there has to be about $8 million a day of new investment into BTC.


The above is the result of 1TH of mining on Viabtc. Since the halving on 11 May it is mining at a loss. Before the halving, mining difficulty was to readjust over 6 days, but today 7 days later it is expected to take another 3 days. This slowing down is due to miners leaving the network.

BTC mining profitability through price increase.

We can use the chart above to calculate the required price increase to break even on mining at the 100 EH mining today. This is ( 849/749*9000) which is $10,241. Over the last week BTC price have exceeded $10,000 briefly only to fall back to the mid $9000. There does not seem to be enough support among bitcoin supporters.

BTC mining profitability through reduction in hashrate

A mining breakeven can also be achieve if another ( 100 - 749/849*100) 12 EH of miners leave the network. This is a sizeable amount as the total hashrate mining on the BCH amd BSV chain is only about 5 EH.

Inefficient miners will stop mining.

As of today there are still 103 EH mining on the BTC chain. The price of BTC has increased from $8500 to $9500 but the number of miners have only reduced slightly from 120. Less efficient independent miners in mining pools must soon stop mining after the next difficulty adjustment in 3 days if the price does not increase.

BTC chain is slowing down and this is dangerous

The average number of blocks mined a day is about 122 compared to the 144 expected. Surprisingly the mempool has not grown much. This means that there are not many backed up transactions waiting to be processed. BTC is not suffering from a glut in popularity.

Chain Death Spiral

The chain death spiral is the theory that the BTC chain will grind to a halt if miners exit the network suddenly. This is because BTC does not have an emergency difficulty adjustment mechanism as in BCH and BSV.  BTC chain has already slowed from 10 minutes a block to 12. The problem is that when the readjustment does take place in say 3 days from today there will not be much change in the difficulty and that will have to last another 2016 blocks which on current performance could take a month.

Between BTC price increasing and miners leaving the network, miners are more likely to leave the network. This will slow the network down even more and people will start to notice. Will a white knight emerge to prop up the price, leading to a bull market and saving BTC?






Thursday, May 14, 2020

BTC BCH BSV Miners Hashrate and Price

With BTC halving yesterday all three coins have halved and we can now expect that miners will be rational and mine profitably. Prior to halving BTC normally commands up to 98% of total hashrate. As of today (14/5/2020) this has reduced to 89% or 95 ExaHash and blocks found over the last 24 hours have reduced to 109 block from the standard of 144 blocks. 

Based on current prices BTC hashrate will decrease to 70% before mining equilibrium is achieved across all three chains. If this happens quickly and the hashrate drops to 84 ExaHash BTC chain will slow to a crawl. Unlike before miners who have left will not return to mine at a loss out of loyalty. Panic may set in when this becomes clear which will lead to a drop in price and we enter the dreaded Chain Death Spiral.


Drop In BTC Hashrate


Block Found in last 24 hours


Profitability Calculations.



What will inefficient BTC Miners do? 

Before Halving   11250  BTC  @ 9500 = $106.8 million =  $0.89 per Exahash (120 Exahash)
After Halving        5625 BTC  @9500  =  $53.4 million  =  $0.56 per Exahash  (95 Exahash )

BTC hashrate must reduce to 70 Exahashes to equate pre halving earning levels. It is currently 91 Exahashes (15/5/2020) . A reduction from 95 yesterday. Where will these miners go will they move to BCH and BSV or will they shut down altogether?


Can they move to BSV or BCH ?

5625 BSV @ 190 = $1.06 million = $0.75 million per Exahash ( 1% = 1.4 Exahash)

Since BTC halving the hashrate of BCH and BSV have increased to 3% and 2% respectively. However the miners who moved here will also be mining unprofitably as the price of BCH and BSV remained stagnant.

Since 11 May 50 Exahashes have been turned off. Only 87 Exahashes are left mining on BTC and it needs to decrease even more.  As a result the BTC chain is slowing down. The next difficulty adjustment is expected in 4 days and perhaps more if more miners stop mining. Even if it makes it to the next difficulty adjustment, the next difficulty is expected to increase from 16.1 T to 16.48 T !! This is a serious problem for the BTC chain.

This situation is fluid and developing. The BTC mempool is increasing fast.


It now cost over $5 to transact on the BTC chain. This situation will get worse. 

Why is the price of BCH ans BSV stagnant?

Since halving the price of BTC moved from $8700 to $9700 but the price of both BCH and BSV did not move in tandem. This can only mean that the supporters of each chain have remained steadfast. 

BTC supporters are unable to push the price past the required level of $14,000 at least. BSH and BSV supporters can remain where they are. Unless BTC supporters moved over to either of these two chains their prices will remain stagnant. The ball is in BTC supporters court. As the mempool bloats, and cost of transactions get ever higher, panic will set in.

Because BTC chain is slowing down, it is unlikely that BTC price will go any higher. If panic sets in BTC price will collapse.  At time of BTC halving it was expected that the next difficulty was to be readjusted in 6 days that has now passed and it is expected to take another 3 days. I suspect that it will be even longer possibly another 6 days. If this is true then the next difficulty adjustment could take as long as a month! Something will break before then.

BTC miners have been net selling mined coins since the halving


This graph from Byte Tree shows the net selling by BTC miners since the halving. 





Tuesday, April 14, 2020

After halving miners must morph into Transaction Processors

As I write this we are just a day past the BSV halving, two days past BCH halving, and another 30 days before BTC halving.


A note on crypto prices

Price changes in alts follows the price of  BTC because alts are  mainly paired against BTC on almost all exchanges. This will remain the case unless we can decouple from BTC.

One way that this can happen is to pair against Tether (USDT). As of today it has a marketcap of 6.5 billion, an increase of about 2.5 billion recently. However Tether will need a much higher marketcap in order to replace BTC.

Another is if a clear winner to emerge out of the BTC, BCH and BSV hash war.

Mining Economics

For the next 30 days most miners will mine the BTC chain. BCH and BSV chains will revert to their foundation miners Btc.com for BCH and Coingeek for BSV.


Mining at a loss, hodling and waiting for the price to rise.

If the halving of BCH and BSV is any guide, BTC. will most likely maintain price prices on a bearish tone. This means that BTC mining will also be unprofitable.

It is unlikely that miners will continue to mine at a loss. Less efficient miners will have to leave until the difficulty adjusts for mining to be profitable again.

Some miners may decide to mine and hold until the price increases, but this is a risky proposition.

For BTC the Chain Death Spiral also threatens like "Democleas Sword".  BTC will be at maximum difficulty after halving, A huge drop in hashrate could trigger it.

Mining dynamics after BTC halving.

Opportunistic mining - On BCH and BTC difficulty is adjusted every block. Some miners will wait until the difficulty adjust low enough before they start mining on the chain. This is more noticeable on the BCH chain.

Price hodling - Miners leaving the BTC chain may choose to mine on BCH or BSV as the chance of these coins doubling will be higher because of it's lower prices.

Pick a winner - This will be hard to predict.

Transaction fee model - BSV wins as it is the only blockchain designed for this.

It is all about transactions

Bitcoin was designed for mining revenue to transition over to transaction fees. The halving in block subsidy was designed to incentivise this. It is incomprehensible how BTC supporters can ignore this simple reality? In the graph above we can clearly see that Fee percentage in blocks between BCH and BSV have diverge considerably after the halving. This trend will continue. BSV will continue to increase the number of transactions per block because it is designed for users to write data to the blocchain.

The major transaction volume on BSV are users writing weather data ( weathersv) and exchange data (preev) to the blockchain. However on the horizon are real enterprise users in supply chain management (unisot) (kowr) and medical data (EHR).


A new model for miners as transaction processors.

There will be a paradigm change. Miners need security of income in order to justify spending millions in hard and soft infrastructure. They will become transaction processors.

They will be able to contract with large enterprise users exclusively to process their transactions thus guaranteeing a reliable income stream. Such contracts will be hard to disrupt as a bond of trust will develop between the parties. It will also incentivise the miner to improve their service in order to keep their customers.

Buy the dip sell the top

For BSV supporters, an opportunity exist to buy the dip and sell the top until BTC halving because it will be volatile. Risky, but if you can time it right, there is an opportunity to multiply your holdings. Use wallets like Exodus, Coinomi and move between BSV and USDT. Warning - It is risky and very difficult to time the bottom and the top and too easy to get emotionally involved. Only risk what you can afford to lose. Remember most people "can pick it but cannot time it".

BSV flipped BCH in January but could not maintain the lead. In all likelihood BSV will again flip BCH before BTC halving. If this happens look for BSV to moon and win the hash wars as miners chase profits.