Bitcoin Halving
What is Bitcoin halving?
Bitcoin halving is a mechanism built into Bitcoin’s mining algorithm to directly reduce the mining rewards in half. The halving mechanism mainly aims to control the inflation of Bitcoin’s price by slashing out half of the current mining rewards given to Bitcoin miners. This can be explained by holding other variables such as demand constant while the supply of BTC is diminished in half leading to a theoretical increase in BTC price.
Currently, Bitcoin has an inflation rate of less than 2% annually as a result of the latest Bitcoin halving that happened 2 years ago.
When was the last time Bitcoin halved?
The recent Bitcoin halving was in May 2020 which reduced the mining rewards from a substantial 12.5 BTC per block to 6.25 BTC per block. Bitcoin halving is usually accompanied by the BTC price surge a few months before or after the halving. However, it has become more difficult to anticipate the price movement lately due to the global speculation of the halving.
What date is the next Bitcoin halving?
By the Bitcoin protocol, the mining rewards get cut in half, a.k.a. Bitcoin halving, once every 210,000 new blocks are generated. At the current rate of Bitcoin mining, the next Bitcoin halving is expected to happen in 2024 theoretically. No one knows the precise date since it solely depends on the remaining blocks.
How often is Bitcoin halved?
Statistically, the Bitcoin halving countdown is expected to happen every 4 years by the current rate of new blocks being generated. The table below shows the most recent Bitcoin halving dates and price of the mining rewards:
Altogether, there will only be a total of 64 Bitcoin halvings. After the 64th halving, which is expected to occur in 2140, there will be a total of 21 million BTC in circulation and no more BTC will be created after that.
What will happen next Bitcoin halving?
As mentioned above, the mining rewards will certainly be restricted to 3.125 BTC per block generated in the 4th Bitcoin halving followed by volatile BTC price movement during that period. However, the BTC price is expected to increase if the theory holds true.
Will Bitcoin go up after halving?
Historically, there was always an increase in the price of BTC during the halving events. The surges sometimes happened before or even after the halving. Most experts described these price surges as a direct result of the Bitcoin halvings.
So, hypothetically, Bitcoin halving encourages the BTC price to go up despite other factors in the equation. However, since many people are aware of the situation and have been speculating, the impact of BTC price may have been canceled out by other variables.
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