Gaming the Difficulty Jump

[dbell]

Bitcoin difficulty jumped up 20% and at nearly the same time Hash Rate jumped up 30% to 40%!   It seems like some big player timed the addition of 3 or 4 Petahash to the network so they could get a full 2160 block cycle at a fixed rate of difficulty.  Some big players doing a little strategic gaming or are there other explanations?

Current average time between blocks is already down at 7.2 minutes.  At this rate, instead of the standard 15 days, it would only be 11 days until the next change in difficulty. 

Does this look like a strategic move to anyone else?

[xstr8guy]

The stats always go a bit wacky after a difficulty adjustment.  The hashrate is only an estimate and will settle down after a couple of days.

[minerva]

The stats always go a bit wacky after a difficulty adjustment.  The hashrate is only an estimate and will settle down after a couple of days.

It's only an estimate based on how many blocks are released.