Cryptocurrency
Litecoin’s Mining Power Tanks to Lowest in Year Following Price Plunge
As Coindesk reports, “Litecoin’s price plunge in recent months has whittled away the profitability of mining the cryptocurrency, leading to a shakeout among computer operators on the network seen as a faster and cheaper but less secure version of bitcoin. “Prices for litecoin, created in 2011 just two years after bitcoin, have fallen to about […]
As Coindesk reports, “Litecoin’s price plunge in recent months has whittled away the profitability of mining the cryptocurrency, leading to a shakeout among computer operators on the network seen as a faster and cheaper but less secure version of bitcoin.
“Prices for litecoin, created in 2011 just two years after bitcoin, have fallen to about $45, from a peak around $140 in June. And under the network’s original programming design, rewards for mining new blocks of data were slashed by 50 percent on Aug. 5, an every-four-years event known as a halving.
“The combination of factors has cut the profits of mining litecoin using the popular Innosilicon A6+ computers to $1.68 per 24 hours, from $2.65 in mid-June, assuming a standard electricity cost, according to f2pool. That’s a slim margin for a machine that costs $3,000 new, according to the manufacturer’s website.
“Operators using the older-model and less-powerful Antminer L3 computers are currently getting a negligible profit of just 6 or 7 cents a day, f2pool’s mining profitability calculator shows.
“So, many smaller litecoin miners are now simply choosing to drop off the network, evidenced by a decline of more than 70 percent since July in the network’s hash rate, which measures the combined computing processing power of all operators. On Nov. 30, litecoin’s hash rate touched 149.6 terahashes per second, the lowest in a year…”