Difficulty increase - 60%

[Serge]

Will BTC catch $10 mark next week?

[dust]

Difficulty does not drive price, only the reverse is true.  However, an increase in press exposure and interest may cause a rise to $10 next week.

[Serge]

Same exposure drives difficulty up too.

[Alex Beckenham]

Is there some page somewhere that lists the difficulty history? And possibly, what date/time each jump occurred?

[proudhon]

Is there some page somewhere that lists the difficulty history? And possibly, what date/time each jump occurred?

At one time I was able to get that info from here:  http://nullvoid.org/bitcoin/difficultiez.php

But the site doesn't work anymore.

[tomcollins]

Is there some page somewhere that lists the difficulty history? And possibly, what date/time each jump occurred?

I had this before my computer crashed   I wrote a script that looked at Block Explorer.  If you really want to, you can use block explorer and go every 2016 blocks.

[inh]

http://bitcoin.sipa.be/

[foo]

Is there some page somewhere that lists the difficulty history? And possibly, what date/time each jump occurred?

http://blockexplorer.com/q/nethash

[Serge]

Difficulty increase due in about 4-5 hours from the time of this posting   
240K

[Alex Beckenham]

Difficulty increase due in about 4-5 hours from the time of this posting  
240K

Next question then: How does one find out in advance what the difficulty is going to be 5 hours into the future?

I uploaded a page at http://bitcoindifficulty.com a few weeks ago but I'd like to add a little more info there.

[FooDSt4mP]

Difficulty increase due in about 4-5 hours from the time of this posting  
240K

Next question then: How does one find out in advance what the difficulty is going to be 5 hours into the future?

I uploaded a page at http://bitcoindifficulty.com a few weeks ago but I'd like to add a little more info there.

If you're on IRC, /msg gribbl ;;bc,stats
Current Blocks: 124943 | Current Difficulty: 157426.20628986 | Next Difficulty At Block: 124991 | Next Difficulty In: 48 blocks | Next Difficulty In About: 4 hours, 38 minutes, and 24 seconds | Next Difficulty Estimate: 242650.45956159

[unk]

theymos's site

http://blockexplorer.com/q/estimate

http://blockexplorer.com/q

[Serge]

Difficulty increase due in about 4-5 hours from the time of this posting  
240K

Next question then: How does one find out in advance what the difficulty is going to be 5 hours into the future?

I uploaded a page at http://bitcoindifficulty.com a few weeks ago but I'd like to add a little more info there.

I look at http://bitcoincharts.com
Difficulty   157426
Estimated   242936 in 43 blks
Blocks/hour   12.72

and count from there

Thanks for the irc command, yrral86! One day I'll hop in there, haven't been on irc networks in ages

[mjsbuddha]

Difficulty does not drive price, only the reverse is true.  However, an increase in press exposure and interest may cause a rise to $10 next week.

The miners that sell their bitcoins on mt. gox are about to have 60% less to sell. Unless there's suddenly a random 60% drop in demand then of course the price will go up. Press exposure is the biggest determiner of price but supply has an effect as well.

[rezin777]

Difficulty does not drive price, only the reverse is true.  However, an increase in press exposure and interest may cause a rise to $10 next week.

The miners that sell their bitcoins on mt. gox are about to have 60% less to sell. Unless there's suddenly a random 60% drop in demand then of course the price will go up. Press exposure is the biggest determiner of price but supply has an effect as well.

Err... the amount of "new" bitcoins to sell will always try to be the same (difficulty aims for 6 blocks an hour), they will just be spread among more miners.

[Littleshop]

Difficulty does not drive price, only the reverse is true.  However, an increase in press exposure and interest may cause a rise to $10 next week.

The miners that sell their bitcoins on mt. gox are about to have 60% less to sell. Unless there's suddenly a random 60% drop in demand then of course the price will go up. Press exposure is the biggest determiner of price but supply has an effect as well.

That is true.  Some of them are currently selling cheap too! 

[JJG]

Difficulty does not drive price, only the reverse is true.  However, an increase in press exposure and interest may cause a rise to $10 next week.

The miners that sell their bitcoins on mt. gox are about to have 60% less to sell. Unless there's suddenly a random 60% drop in demand then of course the price will go up. Press exposure is the biggest determiner of price but supply has an effect as well.

Err... the amount of "new" bitcoins to sell will always try to be the same (difficulty aims for 6 blocks an hour), they will just be spread among more miners.

Not true.

Right after the difficulty is adjusted, 1 block will be generated approximately every 10 minutes.

As miners join the network, more power is thrown at the problem. With more power, block generation time goes down.

Thus, while difficulty is increasing, block generation time is lowest right before a difficulty increase.

Right now the network is doing 12.63 blocks per hour. Compare that the the 6 that it should be doing. After the difficulty increase, we'll be much closer to 6.

[tomcollins]

Difficulty does not drive price, only the reverse is true.  However, an increase in press exposure and interest may cause a rise to $10 next week.

The miners that sell their bitcoins on mt. gox are about to have 60% less to sell. Unless there's suddenly a random 60% drop in demand then of course the price will go up. Press exposure is the biggest determiner of price but supply has an effect as well.

The coins sold on mtgox are not just mined coins.  There has been around 30-40k orders per day on mtgox.  At most, 12,000 of those were from coins mined per day.  The other 28,000 come from somewhere.  Some might be the same ones recycled (someone trading in and out for profit).  But if we drop from 12,000 per day down to 7,200 per day, It's a 12% drop in the coins available for selling (assuming all 12,000 were sold quickly).  It's going to be much less dramatic than you might think.  My guess is those with large holdings are selling off small amounts to get some money now, rather than new miners, who may be selling but aren't a huge factor.

The difficulty increase should be priced in, since it's not going to be a surprise.  People expect there to be fewer available in the future so they'll buy now, driving the price back up.  If the market is priced well, we shouldn't see any change.  Obviously it's not, but it's too hard to say which way it's incorrectly priced.

rezin- although the amount aims to be the same, it isn't always the case.  The last few days have been mining 10 blocks/hour instead of 6.  That will change when difficulty increases.

[rezin777]

Difficulty does not drive price, only the reverse is true.  However, an increase in press exposure and interest may cause a rise to $10 next week.

The miners that sell their bitcoins on mt. gox are about to have 60% less to sell. Unless there's suddenly a random 60% drop in demand then of course the price will go up. Press exposure is the biggest determiner of price but supply has an effect as well.

Err... the amount of "new" bitcoins to sell will always try to be the same (difficulty aims for 6 blocks an hour), they will just be spread among more miners.

Not true.

Right after the difficulty is adjusted, 1 block will be generated approximately every 10 minutes.

As miners join the network, more power is thrown at the problem. With more power, block generation time goes down.

Thus, while difficulty is increasing, block generation time is lowest right before a difficulty increase.

Right now the network is doing 12.63 blocks per hour. Compare that the the 6 that it should be doing. After the difficulty increase, we'll be much closer to 6.

Well that's why I said "try" to be once every 10 minutes. We are just talking about lag.

[tomcollins]

Difficulty does not drive price, only the reverse is true.  However, an increase in press exposure and interest may cause a rise to $10 next week.

The miners that sell their bitcoins on mt. gox are about to have 60% less to sell. Unless there's suddenly a random 60% drop in demand then of course the price will go up. Press exposure is the biggest determiner of price but supply has an effect as well.

Err... the amount of "new" bitcoins to sell will always try to be the same (difficulty aims for 6 blocks an hour), they will just be spread among more miners.

Not true.

Right after the difficulty is adjusted, 1 block will be generated approximately every 10 minutes.

As miners join the network, more power is thrown at the problem. With more power, block generation time goes down.

Thus, while difficulty is increasing, block generation time is lowest right before a difficulty increase.

Right now the network is doing 12.63 blocks per hour. Compare that the the 6 that it should be doing. After the difficulty increase, we'll be much closer to 6.

Well that's why I said "try" to be once every 10 minutes. We are just talking about lag.

There is no try.  Do or do not.

Fact is, the number of coins coming on the market from miners will decrease in all likelihood.  How much of the market that represents is anyone's best guess.  Perhaps miners are mostly hoarding and old investors are selling, so it might not affect anything.  Maybe almost all are selling quickly and it will affect a lot.