Bitcoin Price Analysis – A Bullish Awakening » Brave New Coin

Bitcoin (BTC) lived to die another day this week, rising 10% after breaking US$6,800. Overall, price remains down 63% from the record high in December. The market cap stands at US$114.69 billion, with US$3.58 billion traded in the past 24 hours.

Despite mining profitability currently near an all-time low, hash rate and difficulty continue to post record highs. While many factors influence mining profitability, such as price, block times, difficulty, block reward, and transaction fees, decreasing profitability adds to the risk of further centralizing mining, both by mining pool and geographically. The next Bitcoin block reward halving is slated for May 2020.

Meanwhile, the number of transactions per day has averaged 180,000-200,000 since June. This metric has declined significantly for all cryptocurrencies. Transaction costs have also declined significantly, as has the average transaction value in USD, which can be partially attributed to the decline in the price of bitcoin. 

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