Bitcoin Forum

The news of bitcoin is going viral in some part of Africa,including my country where I am from. This makes me eager to know about bitcoin and it's block chain technology,to enable me key into the cryptospace. I am from a third world country and don't have any money to buy bitcoin.

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I decided to look for where I can learn and have the proper knowledge of bitcoin first,before I can think on how to buy and invest in bitcoin so that I don't end up regretting any of my actions after I have purchase bitcoin. I understand that fiat currency in no time will depreciate to nothing,due to high rate of inflation. This has made me to keep wondering,if bitcoin can maintain ones monetary value if purchase as an assest.

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I have read about bitcoin halving which will becoming up next year,what is the significant of this and how come that this happens ? Is it caused by miners or that is how bitcoin technology was designed ?
Gracias

Especially in Africa that we are and some other developing and underdeveloped countries where fiat will depreciate most.

If bitcoin halves, the supply will reduce. It started with 50 BTC as the mining reward before the 2012 halving. Bitcoin halved in November 2012 and the reward earned by miner in each block mined was reduced to 25 BTC, half of previous reward.

Another halving in 2016 and the reward halved to 12.5 BTC

Another halving in 2020 and the reward halved to 6.25 BTC

Halving in 2024 and the reward will halve to 3.125 BTC

The supply is reducing. In economics and in reality, the higher the demand and if the supply is reducing, the higher the price. Bitcoin demand is increasing during and after halving because many people are associating it to buying period when more new, retail and institutional investors will buy more bitcoin and the price will increase than reduce.

This is misleading.

During a halving the supply does not reduce. The supply will continue to increase until the final halving event in ~2140. What does happen during a halving is that the rate of increase of the supply reduces.

So although the supply is continuing to increase, it is increasing more and more slowly as time goes on. And so a demand which is increasing more quickly, or even just increasing at a fixed rate, will outstrip the increase in supply and cause the price to rise.

The demand is fueled first of all by the miners, who feel the crunch on their finances first, so they start to hold more of their coins. This slowly spreads to the service providers of the miners, and their providers, and so on, until it reaches the exchanges and their users, up to which point the price acts perfectly normal and doesn't give any indication of a bull run.

Not only in Africa but almost every part of the world, everyone is feeling geek about bitcoin and want to be identified with such technology because it's a decentralized one, but africa is just oppotuned to be among the fast growing continents with bitcoin adoption.


You don't need to always have money before you can have bitcoin, there are many ways to get bitcoin,one is to exchange it with fiat, another is to earn it, while you can also receive it as gift from someone, since it's a currency, it is more convenient for one to earn it by creating or providing a service which is your value, and receiving bitcoin for payment for such services rendered.

It is true that it is misleading, I would say that the supply of new coins is decreasing because of halving instead of saying that the BTC supply is decreasing. After all, every BTC that are mined are the new BTC that will be added to the total amount circulated in the market. Maybe that's what Charles-Tim meant about the decreasing supply of BTC. Well, BTC supply may decrease if more and more BTC are lost due to losing the wallet seed phrase just like what happened to other people losing the wallet and unable to recover the wallet.

Regardless of the other questions asked by the OP, I think that what he is most interested in is still contained in the title. What we know is that the halving happens every 210 000 blocks, which is approximately every 4 years, and that the reward for miners is halved by 50% at that moment. We also know from a short (but meaningful Bitcoin history) that the price of Bitcoin has increased significantly after each halving, and it is possible that this will happen even after the halving in 2024.

That event therefore, in my opinion, has a certain psychological dimension, because investors expect a large profit, while on the other hand, miners have less and less influence on the market, considering that they "produce" less and less new BTC.

The current calculation says that about 900 BTC is mined daily (on average 1 block every 10 minutes - 144 blocks x 6.25 = 900 BTC x 30 days = 27 000 per month), which is not an amount that can significantly influence the market, where there are already 19+ million BTC. In about ten years, halving will no longer be so important because 99% of all BTC will have already been mined, and the 1% will remain for the next 100+ years.

That is also misleading because there is no difference between new and old coins. As @o_e_l_e_o wrote, the thing that is decreasing is the rate of increase in the supply, and the proper term for that is production.

You think so?. Maybe I didn't explain it more clearly though I am right about the production of BTC is decreasing since the BTC reward from mining is decreasing every halving but the total amount of BTC in circulation have change. Maybe I should have explained it this way where the NEW COINS I said will be added to the current amount of BTC in circulation instead I should have explained that new batch of BTC will be added rather than new coins. It is not my intention to say that new mined BTC is different from the old ones though there's difference between the two which is the mined BTC is a reward for miners that haven't been circulation where the old ones have been in circulation already. My point is about the decrease of supply and not between the old and new mined BTC.

There is absolutely no way to put a number on the number of coins which have been lost this way, and there is also absolutely no way to guarantee that such coins are actually lost and won't be recovered in the future, either from the owner finding a back up, remembering some important piece of information, brute forcing their missing words, lying about losing it in the first place, etc., or from advances in technology and quantum computers being able to recover such "lost" coins. Given this, it is wrong to say that such coins have been removed from the supply. They could all be moved at any time (and that includes all of Satoshi's coins).

The current number of bitcoin which have been provably lost, burned, unclaimed, or are otherwise unspendable and can therefore be removed from supply numbers only (at present) 2,828.654 BTC.

I agree, and you are right. But I am not referring to bitcoin circulating, maximum or total supply, all I am referring to is the mining supply (how mining reward is reducing) and the increasing demand. That is why I also included how the mining supply is decreasing to further not to confuse the OP. I might not have constructed it well, but I do not think it is up to a way OP should not know what I am talking about. Although, you are correct, thanks for the correction.

Don't use mining supply. Only Total supply, Circulating supply, Block reward and Mining reward. Mining reward includes block reward and transaction fee.

Block rewards halve every 210,000 blocks.

It is misleading like saying Bitcoin is deflationary cryptocurrency. It is not. It is inflationary but the inflation is reduced after 210,000 blocks that last about four years.
https://bitcoinblockhalf.com/images/bitcoin-inflation-chart.png (https://bitcoinblockhalf.com)
Past halvings (https://bitcoinblockhalf.com/)

Interesting to see a fourth halving progress. (https://buybitcoinworldwide.com/stats/halving-progress/)
https://i.imgur.com/HM9uYnY.png

From my understanding, this means that at 2028,after the halving the increase in supply will reduce to 1.5625 and at 2032, it will halve 0.178 and so on..

If at 2140 the amount of bitcoin mined reduces,at what year do you think miners will not have any fraction of bitcoin to mine ? Or will they depend on transaction fee to keep the mining business ongoing ? Don't you think that this will affect the price of bitcoin and its availability for a poor man to purchase. This means that at the long run bitcoin will not be able to be adopted by everyone due to very little supply. Well by then we must have all pass on,so I don't need to worry about this.
Gracias

It’s all about supply & demand. If something is in high demand & you halve the supply of new additions (newly mined coins) what do you think happens?

Some info here:

https://cointelegraph.com/learn/bitcoin-halving-how-does-the-halving-cycle-work-and-why-does-it-matter/amp

This is one the conception many of newbie including some old users get wrong when they newly briefing of cryptocurrency and especially bitcoin precisely, note: that bitcoin  is digital currency and it technology can fail any time any minute because  its a virtual money which you not hold but can be feel, the world originated with money and its a kind of money that's is been feel and touch such as fiat currency, fiat currency is an ancient currency and no depreciation that will occur In fiat currency that will make it to be valueless, let us have it in mind that without fiat currency existing bitcoin wouldn't have a much bond on earth, so therefore fiat currency is the greatest no matter its precised country inflation.

That can't be right because when you cut the supply of new coins in half, you are still increasing the total supply by that amount every ten minutes.

0.78125 BTC, rather than 0.178 BTC, but essentially you are correct. The dates are not set in stone, however. A halving occurs every 210,000 blocks, which on average will be almost 4 years, but not necessarily so.

After the final halving in approximately 2140, the block subsidy will be zero, and all the reward that miners receive for mining will come from transaction fees. It will be several decades before this however that the block subsidy becomes so small as to be insignificant when compared to fees.

I don't think so. If it becomes too expensive to own a single bitcoin, then buy a millibitcoin. If that becomes too expensive, then buy a few thousand sats.

Actually, we have already mined more than 90% of the maximum supply.
What's being mined today are just a fraction of the average 21m bitcoins that would be mined.
If that's an issue, we should be experiencing that issue right now.

What it means is, the supply isn't all about the newly mined bitcoins but also about the already circulating supply.
Not that that all those 19million bitcoins are just on hodl or lost, most are still part of the circulating supply.

It's fine that you don't have money to invest in Bitcoin right now, you will be able to focus on learning more about Bitcoin instead of thinking how to make fast money investing in Bitcoin, you are welcome to this forum, this is the right place to know everything about crypto and particularly, Bitcoin, here are things that I passed through when I was a newbie like you.

1. Bitcoin is a long-term investment, there is no get-rich-quick scheme investing in Bitcoin.

2. If you've learned about Bitcoin's usefulness and advantages, always research which Bitcoin wallets are the safest place to store your Bitcoin. Custodial wallets are generally red flags.

3. If you accumulate Bitcoin in a bear market, there will be no need to worry about price fluctuations.

Bitcoin was not created to be something that people invest in at price X and then sell at price Y - because if we all think like that, then Bitcoin will fail in the future. Given that the majority of investors have their exit price, and that there are those who have so much money that they can buy most of the BTC that will be offered on the market - will we have a situation in 10 or 15 years where most of the coin will be in the hands of a few dozen companies or rich individuals?


Maybe that is true, maybe not - because past events do not guarantee that the past will repeat itself and that those who invest today will not have "problems" with volatility.

As an African I am impressed with the growing rate of the spread of bitcoin and the acceptance it's gain among the industrious youths.  However the lack of money seems to be a partial barrier in terms of having ownership of bitcoin. But, OP for someone like you that have found himself in the forum if you have any ICT skills like a web/graphic designer etc,  you can render your service to those who might be in need of it in exchange for payment with BTC . And in that way you can own bitcoin without having to wait until you have fiat money in purchasing it.

Your interest in wanting to learn as to have proper knowledge of bitcoin first before delving into any form of investment on it is a wide decision that not all newbies posses and I'll like to drop some few materials that can be useful.
How to earn Bitcoins (by Lauda) https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1629118.0

Mastering Bitcoin
https://github.com/bitcoinbook/bitcoinbook

The halving is the predictable reduction in the issuance of new bitcoin and it is significant for a few reasons.

- It cuts the block subsidy in half and reduces Bitcoin's inflation.
- It increases the stock-to-flow ratio of bitcoin.
- It has a significant impact on the profitability and sustainability of bitcoin miners

The Block Subsidy
Every 210,000 blocks (approximately 4 years) the supply of newly generated bitcoin in each block (commonly called the block subsidy) is cut in half which ensures that Bitcoin's inflation is kept under control and slows to a halt over time. This predetermined and known reduction in the block subsidy is an important part of what keeps bitcoin scarce.  

Stock-To-Flow Ratio
The stock-to-flow (S2F) ratio of any given asset is a way to measure how "hard" or scarce money is which is a good way to tell how well something will be able to store value into the future. A higher S2F ratio indicates that the commodity is more difficult to produce, making it more resistant to inflation and a better store of value over a long period of time.

When the halving takes place, the stock to flow ratio of bitcoin increases which makes bitcoin a "harder" money because it is now that much more difficult to increase the supply of. The stock-to-flow ratio of any given asset is the current global supply (stock) and the current rate of inflation (flow) will change. Since the flow is cut in half, the stock to flow ratio increases.  

Impact On Bitcoin Miners
One of the most important impacts of the halving is how it affects bitcoin miners. Since miners are (currently) primarily compensated with the block subsidy, the having causes the least efficient miners to shut down their mining operations and either relocate to part of the world where there is more abundant and cheaper electricity or sell their hardware to someone else who has access to cheaper and more abundant electricity. This is an incredibly important feature of bitcoin mining because if there was never a reduction in the creation of new coins, bitcoin miners would continue to consume more and more electricity to mine more bitcoin with no real end in sight. The halving (as well as the difficulty adjustment) ensures that only the most energy efficient miners are able to continue to operate. When miners have to shit down or relocate their operations, the electricity consumed by less efficient miners will be freed up to be allocated doing something else that consumers are willing to pay more for.

Bitcoin halving is an important part of Bitcoin protocol which usually occur after every 4 year. Bitcoin halving is a design code which fit by the owner of Bitcoin Satoshi nakamoto in Bitcoin protocol during launching to control the supply of Bitcoin and ensure that it retain it's value over a time.
Through halving the reward of miner reduce to half as a result BTC become increasingly scarce, and due to that reason we got a rise in BTC price. Halving play a role of like revival in Bitcoin cycle which revive the price of Bitcoin after every 4 year.

I guess these terms we throw around arent fully understood because i equally thought it was misleading :-\

But is it safe to say that all what bitcoin halving is all about is to reduce the supply of new coins into circulation as mining difficulty goes up meaning low supply, high demand(*** though demand is not guaranteed as it could drop**)  which equals to prices forced to go up.

That's the idea so that all the total BTC won't be mined in such a short time and I think that's why there's halving after 210 000 blocks are mined. I know that you are aware of the other reasons why it is like that just like what you have explained. I think it is not that easy to explain or to make people understand about a topic when you are not explaining it in person or live. I also am not good at explaining things by words but I try my best