The Bitcoin mining industry has grappled with dwindling revenues since the last halving event in 2024, which saw miners’ reward drop from 6.25 BTC to 3.125 BTC. On top of this, the mining difficulty has continued to climb, making it more challenging to secure the Bitcoin network.
Despite the rising price of BTC over the past year, the miners have struggled to remain profitable while securing the world’s largest blockchain. A crypto expert has shared insights into the Bitcoin mining industry over the past few months in the current cycle.
Miners Could Be Forced To Shed BTC Holdings: Crypto CEO
In a September 5 post on the X platform, Alphractal founder and CEO Joao Wedson discussed the Bitcoin mining landscape with insights from recent on-chain data. According to the on-chain analyst, the BTC mining sector has looked a bit unstable so far in the year 2025.
Wedson attributed the Bitcoin mining industry’s struggles partly to the high price of BTC, which surged by almost 100% since the last halving event. The premier cryptocurrency is believed to be highly valued compared to what the blockchain validators earned during the peak years of 2017 and 2021.
According to the Alphractal founder, the combination of rising hash rate and low on-chain volume has added to the competition for winning blocks on the BTC networks. These less-than-optimal conditions create extra pressure, forcing miners to invest in expensive modern equipment to compete.
To put things into an on-chain perspective, Wedson highlighted the Mining Equilibrium Index (MEI), which measures current mining profitability against historical averages (a ratio of short-term to long-term mining revenue efficiency). This metric works by comparing the 30-day average revenue per hash to the 365-day average.
The Alphractal founder shared that the MEI metric staying above 1 signals above-average mining conditions. Meanwhile, when this index falls beneath 0.5, it suggests a struggling mining industry, which could be linked to capitulation or hashrate adjustments.
Source: @joao_wedson on X
Wedson revealed that the Mining Equilibrium Index currently stands around 1.06, which is well above the stressed mining levels where miners can no longer sustain operations. However, the on-chain data expert noted that the current level is also beneath the highs of 2.5 seen between 2017 and 2021.
With the growing competition and operational cost of securing the Bitcoin network, Wedson revealed that miners might be forced to offload some of their BTC holdings. Ultimately, this could put some downward pressure on the price of the flagship cryptocurrency.
Bitcoin Price At A Glance
As of this writing, the price of BTC stands at around $110,700, reflecting no significant movement in the past day. However, the market leader seems to be making a recovery of some sort, jumping by nearly 3% in the past seven days.
The price of BTC on the daily timeframe | Source: BTCUSDT chart on TradingView
Featured image from iStock, chart from TradingView
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