Despite the bearish trend in BTC price action this week, Bitcoin network fundamentals remain strong and resilient.
The latest on-chain data shows that difficulty has reached a new all-time high, while hash rate is close behind. Bitcoin miners are not deterred by the 10% drop in BTC/USD last week, and they continue to compete and secure the network.
This was evident in the network activity on Aug. 22, when difficulty adjusted by 6.17% at its regular biweekly interval.
This adjustment not only pushed difficulty to a new record level, but it also made it the sixth-largest difficulty increase of 2023, according to BTC.com.
Difficulty reflects the level of miner competition and network security, and its upward trend indicates that miners are still profitable despite the price decline.
The next automatic adjustment is expected to follow the same direction, taking difficulty above 56 trillion for the first time ever.