The Bitcoin Minimalist Week 11 - Stratum V2, PayPal Strife, Bank Adoption & QE Ends

Hashrate rises while countries and banks struggle to maintain control on financial system

MitchKlee_

and

Bitbo.io

Oct 14, 2022

This week:

Hashrate continues to hit all-time highs
PayPal to Fine customers for misinformation
BNY Mellon does Bitcoin custody
Bank of England halts QE
Stratum V2 Release

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News

PayPal Backtracks User Fines Of $2,500 For Misinformation

PayPal received backlash on Monday after releasing their new policy stating that anyone who participates in misinformation online will be fined $2,500. After the news and backlash, PayPal called it “confusion,” saying it was a misunderstanding. But not before people started posting photos of their deleted accounts.

America’s Oldest Bank Announces Bitcoin Custody

On Tuesday, BNY Mellon announced they would allow customers to have custody of their Bitcoin with the Bank. This is big, considering the bank is federally supervised, according to Caitlin Long. The same week, the FED also said bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are a risk to the financial system.

Bank Of England Ends Quantitative Easing

After a short stint, the Bank of England announced they would end QE in three days, giving pension fund managers short notice. It was previously forced to start QE last week, citing concerns of economic distress.

Disclose.tv @disclosetv

JUST IN - Bank of England is ending QE this week: "You've got three days left," says Gov. Bailey to pension funds.

Stratum V2

Stratum V2 open-source software was released and covered in a press release by MacKenzie Sigalos on Tuesday. The release is to be tested by several companies before integration, marking the first big upgrade to Bitcoin Mining since 2012.

Some benefits of Stratum V2:

KAZ @btcKaz

@KenzieSigalos Stratum V2 reduces the size of data & encrypts connections between pools and miners. Most importantly, it allows for miners to construct their own block templates, taking it out of pool operators control and further increasing Bitcoin's decentralization. Good reporting MacKenzie

Price

Over the past week, Bitcoin’s price has fallen around 4% from a high of $20,000. The buying power of USD has increased in Bitcoin terms, and macro conditions remain uncertain. Financial metrics are due to come out this week, and it is unknown if the market has priced them in or not.

Even though Bitcoin’s price has been steadily moving sideways, the hashrate and difficulty have risen dramatically since Bitcoin’s local bottom. This rise in hashrate and, subsequently, the difficulty has continued to squeeze mining profits, pushing hard on competition. This squeeze pushes miners towards lower and lower electricity and operating expenses. A race to zero dollars per kWh.

Tweets

Jobs

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What to read

Insights From The 4th Largest Lightning Node Network

- River Financial

Distributed Hash Research: The Effect of ASIC Exhaust 'Mining Pants '

- distributedha.sh

The Bitcoin Minimalist