Bitcoin Forum

Simple calculation has shown that next reward splitting will be more than year before mathematically expected.

Calculated date based on current numbers  is: Saturday, 12 September 2016.

It is mathematically expected, most people just haven't included the effect of lagging difficult adjustment. ^^
Depending on the network power growth this date will vary in months.

Yes.

And today is less than year after splitting. If we add also lagging difficulty adjustment, we will reach 12.5 per block before 2015...

 ::)

Let's have some data:
Reward halving occurs every 210,000 blocks.
Currently we are at block 253,606

So we have 210,000 - 43,606 = 166,394 blocks left until the reward halving.

Without any difficulty change:
166,394 at 6 per hour = 1155 days (20.10.2016)

With 15% growth every adjustment = 1155 / 1.15 = 1004 days (22.05.2016)

With 25% growth every adjustment = 1155 / 1.25 = 924 days (03.03.2016)

So...uhm how did you calculate to get 2015?


Edit: Corrected the math ^^

he may assume diff goes up by 50% every adjustment.

and... With 100% growth every adjustment = 1155 * 0 = 0 days ???

Divide by 1 + D rather than multiplying with 1 - D to obtain the correct amount of days until the halfing.

www.bitcoinclock.com

What a strange assumption, that would require an exponential curve of the order (difficulty)(1.5)^x, and would mean that the amount of hashing devices would more than double every month.

It really doesn't seem sustainable, I want OP to elucidate.

Oh thanks for pointing that out. Indeed, my bad.
Edited my post.

+1

It is not sustainable, thus autumn 2015 does not fit

Inflation will finally be at a point that Bitcoin is built for.

this estimate doesn't take gradually rising network speed into account

if network speed keeps increasing, then the real reward-drop date will creep further and further forward, compared to that estimate

(as you can usually see if you keep checking bitcoin clock's estimate over a few weeks)

example: right now it says


...let's see what it says in a few weeks :D

This is true, but I'd say its the closest estimate you can get.  I do not think 2015 will be the next block rewarding, that would be way ahead of schedule.  How long do you believe ASICs will keep folding over the hashrate 100%/month?

I think 22.05.2016 or earlier is a way better estimate. It's very likely that we will have 15% or more growth in computing power.

well, just going by the experience of seeing the clock's first reward-drop prediction (early december 2012) creep ahead by about 2 months in the time that i watched it, my personal guess for the next one is may 2016

edit: wow i just noticed birdy predicted the same :D

Blocks are being found at greater than 6 per hour.
Because hashing power keeps increasing, and difficulty a) increases later, and b) only catches up with current difficulty, and does not attempt to compensate for the time that has past since the last increase.
This means that the ideal average of 10 minutes per block is not being reached.

Yeah I know, why did you quote half of my post and didn't quote the rest where exactly this is included just to tell me that again?

Hopefully there will be less miners and difficult will be lower.

Even if there would be less miners, technology (e.g. better mining chips) is going to increase difficulty.
It is very unlikely that we will see a lower difficulty any time soon.

well look at that, it's already crept ahead by 19 hours over just the last 3.5 days :o

Depends on price.  If the bears get their wish and we really capitulate hard, we could see a temporary dip in difficulty a few months out.  Non refundable preorders may smooth it out though.

Network totat: 500 Thash/sec = 500,000 Ghash/s  
There are mined 3600 btc/day (maybe more)

500,000[GHash/s] / 3600[btc/day] => 139 GHash/s and you will mine 1 BTC/day

with asic ( 0,6-2,5 W/GHash ) it will cost you 2-8 kWh per Bitcoin of electricity => ( $1-$4 ? )

Theoretically we should be around 11.3% inflation of the number of bitcoin in existence (B0) as today.
If we suppose a 25% faster rate of mining, the real inflation of B0 is around 14%/year.

My assumption is a lot of bitcoins are locked in some long term cold storage never touched by anyone, so the real B0 used for daily transactions (the part affecting now the exchange rates with fiat) is a lot lower.
If we suppose all bitcoin mined are sold in the market for cash (to recoup investments and pay for expenses) this would cause a lot larger real inflation of the number of bitcoin available on the market and push the price lower a lot lower.

The  alternatives are two:
1) not all bitcoin mined are sold in the market for fiat, just a minimum needed to pay living expenses. Every profit is left in BTC form.
2) a lot of fiat is, anyway, entering the BTC ecosystem and being converted in BTC (directly via exchanges or indirectly via direct selling of good and service) and these BTC are saved for a later time and not used to buy stuff or services or re-exchanged for fiat, reducing the number of BTC offered on the market.

Faster than designed mining and increasing price of BTC are a good sign. If we get halving ahead of schedule, the inflation will become half overnight ahead of schedule, reducing a lot the offer of newly minted BTC.
BTC  would go ahead of schedule from 9.1% of inflation to 4.55% of inflation per year. The price would skyrocket.
For comparison, the monetary base of € went from 400 to 1.200 billions from 2002 to 2012 (11.2% inflation per year), this in a period where inflation were considered low.

Just now, the inflation in Bitcoin is at par with the inflation in the € (and a bit lower than the US$). The price is driven just by adoption as a payment system and saving.
But as we approach the next halving the reasons to move from fiat to BTC to save become stronger.
Given the current situation, at the next halving, we can expect an advantage of 4.5% on the rate of inflation for Bitcoin against the €.
And there are a lot more advantages to hold bitcoin instead of fiat in the bank or outside the bank (like not be dependant on the bank solvency and liquidity, the central bank restraining, the government limitation).

Bitcoin adoption is far more higher than inflation. When price of Bitcoin goes from $13 to $130 (1,000%) driven by adoption then it does not matter if inflation is 4,55% or 11,3% because 1,000% - 11,3% is almost same as 1,000% - 4,55%.

Edit: even Gox fees are few times higher than inflation (Edit2: this is not true :-) )

Reward-Drop ETA: 2016-10-17 03:57:01 UTC

someone less lazy than me should make an "ETA observer" thread along the lines of wall observer

Reward-Drop ETA: 2016-10-17 01:47:52 UTC (162 weeks, 5 days, 23 hours, 50 minutes)

...and they should call the thread something like "Date for 12.5 BTC per Block".

Reward-Drop ETA: 2016-10-10 13:13:37 UTC (158 weeks, 6 days, 3 hours)

one week in 22 days

Reward-Drop ETA: 2016-09-07 11:17:53 UTC (136 weeks, 6 days, 12 hours, 30 minutes)

so in 4 months the eta dropped by a month? Hmmm. if we extrapolate that then we are looking at maybe March of 2016? March of 2016 = 26 months... so 26/4 = 6.5 months .  9/2016 - 6.5 months = around march of 2016

Only if the hash rate continues to grow exponentially, but at some point in the near future we may see the hash rate stabilize or even drop if mining becomes unprofitable.

I always check bitcoin clock when I'm depressed about the current bitcoin's value.

How can the mining farms survive the block's halving if the price won't increase?

The price WILL increase, which is why everyone is waiting for the reward halving with baited breath. Think about it, supply is 3600 coins a day, price doesn't drop like a stone every day so clearly demand is roughly equal to that supply. The day the reward halves, demand will not change at all, if anything it will increase as everyone scrambles for a slice of the pie that is now half eaten suddenly. Therefor demand is for 3500+ coins a day while less than 2000 are available. Cue the market price increase and volatility increases as supply and demand fight it out to equilibrium

Basicaly what the person above has answered but with an extra
There are always the tx fee which will make the miners keep their gear running even after the future block reward halving

Currently the tx fee is around 10-15 Btc  per day but if the numbers of transactions multiply by 30 with the price increase of 10x we will have the same reward as today from mining fees alone .

Well, we have moved to late July 2016 now. Summer 2016.

Reward-Drop ETA: 2016-07-31 13:45:52 UTC (90 weeks, 2 days, 13 hours, 50 minutes)

Math was not the OP's strongest area, I hope.