Падение хешрейта биткоина связано не только с Китаем: эксперты опровергли мифы о массовых отключениях Headline: Bitcoins Hashrate Drop Linked Not Just to China: Experts Debunk Myths of Mass Shutdowns

The sharp 8% drop in Bitcoin’s hashrate is attributed not solely to incidents in China and is considered to be a temporary issue. This information was reported by TheMinerMag.

On December 13, rumors circulated on social media about the shutdown of between 200,000 to 400,000 mining devices for the leading cryptocurrency. Former co-chairman of mining firm Canaan and founder of Nano Labs, Jack Kong, was among the first to point this out.

Some estimates suggested that the number could have reached as high as 500,000 units with a power capacity of 2 GW.

A few days later, Kong announced that the hashrate of Bitcoin’s blockchain had decreased by 8%, approximately equating to 100 EH/s.

While this drop did occur, it was not exclusively due to the shutdown of mining farms in Xinjiang.

Experts suggest that a significant portion of the decline came from mining pools based in the United States. The largest decreases were recorded by Foundry USA and Luxor, largely as a result of colder temperatures and energy consumption restrictions. Together, these pools accounted for about 200 EH/s of the overall decline.

The hashrate of major pools of Chinese origin—Antpool, F2Pool, ViaBTC, SpiderPool, and Binance Pool—also fell by 100 EH/s. However, many of these pools are located outside of China, meaning some may have been affected by issues beyond the country’s borders.

By December 17, their metrics had nearly recovered, indicating a temporary disruption rather than a complete shutdown of equipment.

An exception was SpiderPool, whose hashrate remained approximately 20 EH/s lower by December 18. TheMinerMag suggests that this indirectly confirms the existence of real, yet limited, shutdowns.

“It is also likely that some miners in Xinjiang might have voluntarily shut down over the weekend to avoid attracting attention during inspections, and subsequently resumed operations quietly once the pressure eased,” they added.

In contrast to Bitcoin, Litecoin saw a notable decline—its hashrate fell by 20% on December 15, from 3.38 PH/s to 2.65 PH/s, and has yet to recover.

“This suggests that the resurgence of mining in the region was not limited to Bitcoin, and other PoW-based networks may be more vulnerable,” the experts concluded.

We remind you that at the end of November, China’s share in Bitcoin mining exceeded 14%, placing the country third in the world for this metric.