The launch of Bitmain AntMiner E9 comes a year after the announcement. Also, the launch comes just before Ethereum’s move to the Proof-of-Stake blockchain raising doubts over its future sales.
Starting today, July 6, the world’s leading mining hardware manufacturer Bitmain will start selling AntMiner E9, its new application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) miner. This new Ethereum miner by Bitmain comes with a hashrate of 2,400M. Besides, it has a power consumption of 1920 watts and a power efficiency of 0.8 joules per minute. According to Bitmain, the AntMiner E9 alone delivers performance equivalent to 25 RTX 3080 graphics cards.
Bitmain announced its new AntMiner model last year when Ethereum mining revenues were on the rise. Interestingly, the launch happens just as the Ethereum blockchain is preparing a transition from proof-of-work to proof-of-stake ahead this year. However, post the merger, the same hardware will be useful for mining cryptocurrencies that rely on the Ethash algorithm.
Ethereum Mining Revenue in the Fall
The broader cryptocurrency market has gone through intense correction so far in 2022. The world’s second-largest crypto Ethereum (ETH) also saw its price plummet by over 70%. On the other hand, the Ethereum network activity has also been on a decline resulting in a drop in miner revenues.
For e.g. last year in April 2021, Ethereum miners were bringing $1.68 billion in revenue. The miner revenue peaked at $2.68 billion during the peak of the crypto market in November 2021. However, the ETH miner revenues have gone down significantly over the last eight months. During the last month, the total miner revenue stood at $549 million.
There was a staggering 45% drop in the ETH miner revenue from the previous month. As reported by The Block, “most of these revenues came from the block subsidy ($498.84 million) and a relatively small amount from transaction fees ($29.64 million) and from uncle rewards ($21.09 million)”.
Bitmain has yet to reveal the price for its AntMiner E9, however, market analysts are estimating it to be anywhere around US$30,000. Considering Ethereum 2.0 transitions, it will be interesting to see whether Bitmain will be able to garner enough sales.
Ethereum Price Correction
The world’s second-largest cryptocurrency has been under severe correction amid the market fall over the last two months. Earlier on Monday, ETH pumped 10% above $1,200, however, it seems a dead cat bounce.
On-chain data shows that ETH will continue to stay under selling pressure. As per data provider Santiment, “Ethereum’s price has rebounded mildly to ~$1,120 on America’s birthday. This said, $ETH continues to move rapidly back on to exchanges and is close to breaking 2022 highs. There is a higher risk of a selloff while coins are rising on exchange wallets”.
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