What Is a ‘Negative Difficulty Adjustment’ and What Causes It?
A negative difficulty adjustment means the network's mining difficulty is reduced. This occurs when the time taken to mine the last 2,016 blocks exceeds the target two-week period.
This is typically caused by a significant number of miners shutting down their operations, often due to falling cryptocurrency prices, rising electricity costs, or regulatory crackdowns, leading to a drop in the total network hash rate.
Glossar
Difficulty Adjustment
Mechanism ⎊ Difficulty adjustment is a crucial mechanism in proof-of-work PoW blockchain networks, particularly Bitcoin, that automatically recalibrates the computational effort required to mine a new block.
Negative Difficulty Adjustment
Mechanism ⎊ Negative Difficulty Adjustment represents a reactive protocol within blockchain networks, primarily those employing Proof-of-Work consensus, designed to maintain consistent block generation times despite fluctuations in computational power ⎊ hashrate ⎊ dedicated to the network.