On Monday, a price breakout seemed possible, but BTC has since weakened and currently stands at around $67,530. Meanwhile, the Bitcoin hashrate crossed the 795 Exahashes per second (EH/s) mark for the first time, Glassnode data show. The higher hashrate, which reflects the overall computing power of the Bitcoin network, makes the network more secure against attacks.

The higher the computing power of miners, the harder it becomes for malicious actors to gain control over more than 50 percent of the Bitcoin network. Although the hashrate is not directly related to the BTC rate, a higher rate does encourage investment in mining equipment, which increases the hashrate.

The increased hashrate has economic implications for the mining industry: with increased difficulty comes increased competition. Mining companies have to invest in new equipment and consume more electricity, which drives up their costs. As a result, the larger mining companies, with more capital and resources, increasingly dominate the market.

Growing challenge for Bitcoin mining industry

The Bitcoin mining sector is currently facing major challenges. After the fourth Bitcoin Halving, many miners are not only feeling the impact of the halved block grant, but also the low transaction fees, which currently stand at $3.51 per transaction. While this is higher than during the summer, it is still significantly lower than at the beginning of this year, when transaction fees made up about 20 percent of the reward - now it is only 6 percent. For many miners, this is a big difference in revenue.

Due to fierce competition, we are seeing a trend toward centralization. Large mining companies are displacing smaller players from the market, and the 12 largest publicly traded miners already contributed more than 200 EH/s in September, representing 29 percent of the total hashrate. These large mining companies have a combined market capitalization of nearly $30 billion, with Marathon Digital (MARA) being the largest at $5.6 billion.

U.S. dominance in the mining sector

The U.S. mining sector occupies a prominent place, as almost all major miners are based in the United States. Mining expert Frederik Dürr warns that rising hashrate and falling profit margins could mean that only the largest players can remain profitable with extremely low costs.

One person will probably be happy about this development: Donald Trump. The Republican presidential candidate and mining enthusiast has indicated that he wants to see all Bitcoin "Made in the USA" in the future. The centralization trend could contribute to this, but whether this is desirable for small BTC hodlers remains another question.