- Ethereum Block Rewards Drop as Block Time Rises
- Ethereum reschedules hard fork to December 31
Ethereum News Today – The block rewards of Ethereum have plunged to its lowest level yet with 10,254 ETH per block worth about $1.5 million a day. Furthermore, 410 Ether per uncle orphaned blocks and 15 Ether for the inclusion of these orphans are given, making it a total of approximately 10,700 Ether. There are also fees of approximately 400 ETH per day, so miners receive about 11,000 Ether, worth $1,550,560.
Ethereum Block Rewards Drop as Block Time Rises
The automatic reduction in the block mining rewards on the Ethereum network is as a result of an increase in block times to almost every 17 seconds now. That is because the difficult bomb has kicked-in. The difficulty bomb is a protocol level algorithm that artificially increases mining difficulty, which also increases the amount of hash power needed to mine a block.
The difficulty bomb will now be delayed for the third time in two weeks in an ‘emergency’ fork that will push it back for two years. So far this year, the Ethereum Foundation developers have not proposed any issuance reduction, with the hard fork which was initially scheduled for January 6 now estimated to take place on December 31.
Unlike the New Year, this will not happen in Australia first, with all needing to upgrade else the get forked off. It seems that some 56 percent of Ethereum Geth synced nodes have upgraded. However, none of Parity upgraded with only two weeks to go. Parity has not revealed its plans to launch the new client, and this could be a mess especially with the Christmas and New Year season.
The Ethereum Foundation States No Reason for the Rush
The Ethereum Foundation has not said anything regarding the rush. So much is unclear, especially due to the recent increase in the block time. In about two weeks, they would be less than 20 seconds. Nevertheless, that is the decision of the developers.
Hence, if you had plans of showing off your Ether fast payments or your DeFi-ence on New Year’s eve to your friends, it appears that may be off for this year as Ether-related services would probably pause. Luckily, at that time, phone services to do not work also. Hence, it might not be too much of an issue, but ETH hodlers, in general, seem to be supporting issuance reduction at the same time as the difficulty bomb is delayed.
The price-performance of Ethereum has also been pretty poor over the past few weeks. At press time, Ethereum is trading at $132 after a decrease of about 7 percent over the past day, and it looks poised for further declines.
Princess Ogono is a writer, lawyer and fitness enthusiast. She believes cryptocurrencies are the future. When she's not writing, she spends time with her adorable cat, Ginger and works out often.
