Cryptocurrency
Bitcoin miners are mining fewer empty blocks in 2020, and it may not all be due to chance
As reported at The Block, “Bitcoin miners are producing fewer empty blocks thus far in 2020 than they did in 2019, and a number of factors ranging from mining machine upgrades to the halving may be at play. “According to The Block’s research, a total of 71 empty blocks, or blocks that do not contain […]
As reported at The Block, “Bitcoin miners are producing fewer empty blocks thus far in 2020 than they did in 2019, and a number of factors ranging from mining machine upgrades to the halving may be at play.
“According to The Block’s research, a total of 71 empty blocks, or blocks that do not contain any transactions, were mined in the first five months of 2020, accounting for 0.3% of the total blocks produced. This is less than half of the 0.79% figure from the same period last year.
“The way mining is structured incentivizes miners to produce empty blocks sometimes. When receiving a new block from the network, miners need to first verify certain pieces of information. During this short time, to avoid wasting hashpower, miners often attempt to find empty blocks. That way they can reap the mining reward and also avoid duplicating transactions already found in the previous block…”